a 


i 


THE    REST    HOLLOW 
MYSTERY 


BY 


REBECCA  N.  PORTER 


NEW  YORK 
THE  CENTURY  CO. 

1922 


r\ 


Copyright,  1922,  by 
THE  CENTURY  Co. 


Printed  in  U-  S.  A. 


TO  MY  BROTHER 
WILLIAM  STRATTON  PORTER 

That  ideal   reader  of  mystery  stories — with 

the    ardor    to    pursue,   the    faith    to   believe 

and  the  magnanimity  to  guess  wrong 


49G43U 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 


THE  REST  HOLLOW 
MYSTERY 

CHAPTER  I 

KENWICK  himself  had  no  recollection  of  the 
accident.  But  he  knew  that  there  must 
have  been  one,  for  when  he  recovered  conscious 
ness,  his  clothes  were  full  of  burrs,  his  hat  was 
badly  crushed,  and  there  was  a  violent  throbbing 
in  one  of  his  legs. 

With  both  hands  gripping  the  aching  thigh  in 
a  futile  effort  to  soothe  its  pain,  he  dragged  him 
self  into  the  clearing  and  looked  about.  It  was 
one  of  those  narrow,  wooded  mountain  ravines 
that  in  the  West  are  classed  as  canons.  Back  of 
him  rose  a  succession  of  sage-covered  slopes, 
bleak,  wintry,  hostile.  In  front  was  a  precipitous 
cliff  studded  with  dwarf  madrone  trees  and  the 
twisted  manzanita.  Overhead  the  bare  distorted 
sycamore  boughs  lashed  themselves  together  and 
moaned  a  dreary  monotone  to  the  accompaniment 
of  a  keen  November  wind.  No  sign  of  autumn 
lingered  on  the  landscape,  and  the  shed  leaves 


4      THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

formed  a  moldy  carpet  underfoot.  The  canon 
was  redolent  with  the  odor  of  damp  timber  and 
decaying  vegetation. 

Kenwick  buttoned  his  heavy  overcoat  about 
him  and  limped  painfully  toward  the  cliff,  keep 
ing  as  nearly  as  possible  a  straight  line  from  his 
starting-point.  Although  his  surroundings  were 
totally  unfamiliar  his  mind  was  clear.  But  he 
had  that  curious  sensation  of  a  man  who  has  slept 
all  night  in  a  strange  bed,  and  in  the  first  moment 
of  wakening  is  unable  to  adjust  himself  to  his 
environment.  While  he  groped  his  way  through 
the  tangled  underbrush  his  memory  struggled  to 
clear  a  passage  back  to  the  present. 

At  the  foot  of  the  cliff  he  stopped  short,  staring 
in  horror  at  a  spot  a  few  paces  ahead  of  him.  A 
scrub  madrone  had  been  torn  from  the  side  of  the 
ravine  and  had  fallen  to  the  bottom  of  the  canon, 
its  mutilated  roots  stretching  skyward  like  the 
grotesque  claws  of  some  prehistoric  animal.  The 
force  which  had  torn  it  from  its  moorings  had 
scarred  the  slope  with  other  evidences  of  disaster; 
a  limb  lopped  off  here,  a  mass  of  brush  ripped 
away  there.  A  glistening  object  caught  his  eye. 
He  stooped  laboriously  and  picked  it  up,  then 
dropped  it,  shuddering.  It  was  a  triangle  of 
broken  glass  spattered  with  blood. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY      5 

For  half  an  hour  he  poked  around  in  the  brush 
searching  for,  yet  dreading  to  find,  a  more  grue 
some  object.  Perhaps  the  driver  had  not  been 
killed  after  all,  he  reassured  himself.  As  he 
dimly  remembered  him,  he  was  a  friendly  sort  of 
fellow  whom  he  had  engaged  to  drive  him  out  to 
the  Raeburn  place.  As  he  climbed  the  steep  hill 
now  Kenwick  tried  to  remember  what  they  had 
been  talking  about  just  before  this  thing  hap 
pened,  but  the  effort  made  his  head  ache  and 
landed  him  nowhere.  A  more  vital  conjecture 
was  concerned  with  how  long  he  had  been  lying 
at  the  foot  of  the  ravine  and  why  no  one  had 
come  to  his  rescue. 

When  he  gained  the  road  there  was  nobody  in 
sight.  It  was  a  splendidly  paved  bit  of  country 
boulevard  curving  out  of  sight  into  what  Ken- 
wick  told  himself  must  be  the  land  of  dreams 
and  romance.  He  turned  to  the  left  and  started 
to  walk,  aimlessly,  hopping  part  of  the  time  to 
save  his  aching  leg.  Surely  some  one  would  over 
take  him  in  a  car  soon  and  offer  assistance.  He 
had  dragged  himself  over  half  a  mile,  stimulated 
by  this  hope,  when  he  sighted  a  house  set  far 
back  from  the  highway  behind  a  vista  of  date- 
palms.  He  struggled  up  to  the  entrance  and 
gazed  through  the  bars  of  a  tall  iron  gate.  It  was 


6     THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

locked.  And,  as  an  extra  precaution  against 
intrusion,  a  heavy  iron  chain  was  swung  across 
the  outside.  Through  the  trees  the  house  was 
plainly  visible,  a  colossal  concrete  structure  with 
stone  trimmings  flanked  on  one  side  by  a  sturdy 
combination  tank-house  and  garage.  About  the 
whole  place  there  was  an  aristocratic,  exclusive 
dignity  that  reminded  Kenwick  of  one  of  the 
great  English  estates  that  he  had  once  visited 
during  a  convalescent  furlough  spent  near  Lon 
don.  It  was  more  like  a  castle  than  a  private 
residence,  with  its  high  stone  wall  covered  by 
dank  clinging  vines.  The  very  trees  that  bor 
dered  the  driveway  had  an  air  of  aloofness  as 
though  they  had  severed  all  relationship  with  the 
rest  of  nature's  family.  It  was  inconceivable, 
Kenwick  told  himself,  that  guests  had  ever  been 
entertained,  unbidden,  in  that  mansion.  And  yet 
it  was  here  that  he  must  apply  for  help. 

Strength  had  deserted  him.  Courage  had  de 
serted  him.  Even  self-respect  was  fast  slipping 
away.  Desperation  alone  remained;  desperation 
lashed  almost  to  fury  by  the  agony  in  his  throb 
bing  leg.  He  or  his  companion  must  have  been 
drunk,  hideously  drunk,  to  have  met  with  such  a 
mischance.  And  yet  where  could  they  have  pur 
chased  a  drink?  He  himself  hated  liquor,  and  he 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY      7 

had  no  recollection  of  having  been  persuaded  into 
illicit  conviviality.  As  he  searched  for  an  open 
ing  in  the  stone  wall,  he  took  hasty  stock  of  him 
self.  The  fur-collared  overcoat  would  give  him  a 
certain  social  status  in  the  eyes  of  this  house 
holder.  His  hat,  though  bearing  the  mark  of 
riotous  adventure,  was  obviously  the  hat  of  a 
gentleman.  His  shoes  subscribed  liberally  to  this 
classification  and  his  dark  broadcloth  suit  was 
conclusive.  He  felt  in  his  pocket.  There  was 
neither  watch  nor  money.  But  he  could  mention 
Raeburn's  name.  The  wealthy  New  Yorker  who 
was  to  have  been  his  host  undoubtedly  stood  high 
in  this  community. 

His  search  along  the  wall  brought  him  at  last 
to  a  broken  ledge  of  rock  which  might  serve  as 
a  stepping-stone.  He  drew  in  his  breath  sharply, 
dreading  the  pain  of  the  stupendous  effort  that 
he  was  about  to  make.  Then  he  placed  his  sound 
foot  on  the  ledge  and  dragged  himself  over  the 
enclosure. 

If  the  place  had  looked  inhospitable  from  the 
outside  it  was  even  more  formidable  viewed  from 
within.  Only  that  portion  of  the  acreage  which 
immediately  surrounded  the  house  was  under  cul 
tivation.  On  either  side  of  this  a  wide  expanse 
of  eucalyptus  forest  sloped  away  from  the  road. 


8      THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

They  were  half-grown  saplings  and  the  blue-gray 
of  their  foliage  blended  with  subtle  harmony  into 
the  somber  winter  landscape. 

"Lord!  What  a  lonely  spot!"  Kenwick  mut 
tered  as  he  followed  the  driveway  around  to  the 
side  of  the  house.  "Good  God !  Anything  could 
happen  in  a  place  like  this !" 

The  shallow  stone  steps  echoed  beneath  his 
feet,  and  the  door-bell,  tinkling  in  some  remote 
region,  gave  back  a  ghostly,  deserted  sound.  Two 
more  trials  with  the  electric  button  convinced 
Kenwick  that  the  place  was  untenanted.  He 
made  a  shade  of  his  two  hands  and  peered  into 
the  plate-glass  window  that  gave  on  the  front 
porch. 

What  he  saw  was  an  elegantly  appointed 
dining-room  furnished  in  old  mahogany  and  dull 
blue  hangings.  There  were  carved  candlesticks  on 
the  sideboard,  and  in  the  center  of  the  bare  dining- 
table  a  cut-glass  bowl  full  of  English  walnuts. 
The  somber  high-backed  chairs  ranged  along  the 
wall  seemed  to  the  man  outside  to  be  guarding 
the  room  like  a  body  of  solemn  gendarmes. 
Slowly  he  turned,  descended  the  shallow  steps, 
and  started  around  to  the  rear  of  the  house. 
There  must  be  some  servant,  he  reasoned,  some 
caretaker  or  gardener  who  could  administer  tern- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY      9 

porary  relief  and  direct  him  to  his  destination. 
The  ache  in  his  leg  was  becoming  unbearable.  It 
was  impossible  for  him  to  go  on  unaided.  How 
ever  reluctant  this  exclusive  home  might  be  to 
admit  a  stranger  within  its  gates,  it  must  conform 
to  the  laws  of  decency  and  bind  up  his  wounds. 

On  the  side  path,  bordered  with  monster 
oleanders  and  dusty  miller,  he  stopped.  The  door 
of  the  garage  was  open.  It  seemed  safe  to  assume 
that  the  chauffeur  or  caretaker  lived  in  the  com 
modious  quarters  overhead.  Hope  glimmered  at 
last  through  the  night  of  black  despair.  Almost 
blind  with  pain  now  Kenwick  staggered  toward 
that  open  door.  In  the  dim  light  of  late  after 
noon  he  made  out  a  small  room  filled  with  garden 
tools.  Beyond,  through  an  inside  window,  was 
revealed  a  handsome  black  limousine  standing 
motionless  in  the  gathering  darkness. 

But  the  building  was  deserted.  It  was  when 
he  realized  this  that  the  dusk  suddenly  enveloped 
the  man  peering  desperately  in  at  the  threshold. 
Through  a  bleak  mist  he  saw  the  lawn-mower, 
garden  hose,  and  beetle-black  car  dance  together 
in  hideous  nightmare.  And  then  the  room  full 
of  garden  tools  rushed  toward  him.  He  felt  the 
wheels  of  that  sinister  black  car  grinding  into  his 
neck,  and  he  knew  no  more. 


CHAPTER  II 

WHEN  Kenwick  came  to  himself  he  was 
lying  on  a  cavernous  divan  with  a  gor 
geous  Indian  blanket  over  him  and  a  tabouret 
drawn  close  to  his  side.  In  a  far  corner  of  the 
room  a  rose-shaded  lamp  was  burning.  It  gave  to 
the  handsome  drawing-room  a  rosy  glow  that 
seemed  to  envelop  its  every  object  in  subtle  mys 
tery.  For  long  minutes  the  sick  man  stared  about 
the  apartment  without  trying  to  move.  Slowly  the 
events  of  the  last  few  hours  came  back  to  him. 
Very  cautiously,  like  a  man  who  has  just  recovered 
his  sight  after  prolonged  blindness,  he  felt  his  way 
back  along  the  path  that  he  had  just  traveled.  It 
brought  him  at  last  to  the  door  of  the  garage  and 
the  beetle-black  limousine  grinding  over  his  neck. 
He  reached  out  and  touched  the  spindle-legged 
table  at  his  side.  On  it  were  his  collar,  tie,  and 
a  long-stemmed  glass- partly  full  of  whisky.  Very 
slowly  he  drained  the  remaining  contents.  Then 
he  sat  upright  and  gently  touched  his  injured  leg. 
It  felt  hard  and  tight.  Whoever  had  done  the 
bandaging  had  made  up  in  force  what  he  had 

10 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY     11 

lacked  in  skill,  but  the  numbness  of  a  too  tight 
wrapping  was  an  intense  relief  after  his  hour  of 
agony.  He  limped  across  the  long  room  to  the 
entrance-hall  and  stood  at  length  in  the  doorway 
of  the  mahogany-furnished  dining-room  guarded 
by  the  row  of  gendarme  chairs. 

This  last  evidence  was  conclusive.  In  some 
way  he  had  gained  admittance  to  the  house  with 
the  barred  gate.  Evidently  there  had  been  some 
one  close  at  hand  when  he  fainted ;  some  one  who 
had  authority  to  carry  him  through  those  impreg 
nable  doors.  The  thought  gave  him  an  uncanny 
feeling.  But  where  was  this  gum-shod  combina 
tion  of  mystery  and  mercy  $  In  the  curious  way 
that  the  senses  convey  such  intelligence  he  felt 
that  the  house  was  empty. 

"Well,  if  I  've  got  to  stay  here  alone  all  night," 
he  said  to  himself,  "I  Jm  going  to  see  what  this 
place  looks  like." 

And  so,  using  two  light  willow  chairs  as 
crutches,  he  started  upon  a  slow  tour  of  explora 
tion.  Through  the  swinging  doors  he  passed  into 
a  butler's  pantry  and  then  into  the  kitchen.  It 
was  a  large  cheerful  room  with  laundry  in  the 
rear.  But  although  there  were  no  soiled  dishes 
about,  it  had  an  undefinable  air  of  untidiness  and 
neglect.  A  crumpled  dish-towel  was  under  the 


12   THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

table.  The  sink  was  grimy  and  the  stove  spotted 
with  grease.  Even  to  Kenwick's  inexpert  eyes 
the  room  appeared  somehow  dirty  and  rq)ellant. 

He  set  the  wine-glass  that  he  had  brought  from 
the  front  room  on  the  table  and  tried  the  back 
door.  It  was  locked  on  the  outside.  Every  door 
and  window  that  he  had  tested  so  far  was  sim 
ilarly  barred.  With  a  vague  feeling  of  misgiving 
he  returned  to  the  drawing-room.  It  was  very 
late.  The  alabaster  clock  on  the  mantel  was 
ticking  its  way  toward  midnight.  He  felt  rav 
enously  hungry  but  shrank  from  touching  any  of 
the  food  upon  the  pantry  shelves.  He  decided 
that  until  his  host  arrived  he  would  sit  in  the  den, 
a  companionable  little  room,  whose  deep  leather 
chairs  invited  him.  The  porte-cochere  was  on 
this  side  of  the  house  and  the  home-comers,  who 
ever  they  were,  would  doubtless  enter  there.  No 
fire  burned  on  the  hearth  but  the  house  was 
comfortably  and  evenly  warm.  It  was  apparent 
that  the  caretaker  was  an  expert  furnace-man. 

Kenwick  was  about  to  sink  into  one  of  the  big 
chairs  opposite  the  huge  antlers  of  a  deer  when 
suddenly  an  object  caught  his  eye.  He  struggled 
over  to  the  telephone  and  took  down  the  receiver. 
For  five  minutes  he  stood  there  holding  it  to  his 
ear  listening  for  the  familiar  hum  that  assures 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    13 

telephonic  health.  But  the  thing  was  dead.  As 
he  hung  it  up,  it  struck  Kenwick  all  at  once  that 
it  might  be  disconnected.  The  idea  brought  him 
a  sense  of  unaccountable  resentment.  "My 
Lord!"  he  muttered.  "I  might  as  well  be  in  a 
jail!" 

He  sank  into  one  of  the  Morris-chairs  and 
gazed  out  into  the  blackness  of  night.  He  could, 
he  reflected,  smash  a  window  and  make  his  escape 
that  way.  But  why  escape  from  comfort  into 
bleakness?  Jail  or  no  jail  he  was  lucky  to  have 
found  such  a  haven.  By  morning  somebody 
would  have  arrived  and  he  could  be  taken  to  old 
man  Raeburn's.  He  was  probably  worrying 
about  him  at  this  very  moment.  "I  did  n't  break 
into  this  place  though,"  Kenwick  reassured  him 
self.  "Somebody  in  authority  brought  me  in,  so 
there  's  nothing  criminal  about  staying  on.  And 
since  there  had  to  be  an  invader,  better  myself 
than  some  unscrupulous  beggar  who  might  make 
off  with  the  family  plate." 

The  reading-lamp  upon  the  table  was  equipped 
with  a  dimmer.  He  drew  the  chain  half  its 
length,  pulled  the  Indian  blanket  over  him,  and, 
in  spite  of  the  dull  ache  in  his  leg,  was  soon 
wrapped  in  the  dreamless  slumber  of  utter  ex 
haustion. 


14   THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

When  he  awoke  it  was  broad  daylight  and  the 
dimly  burning  bulb  of  the  reading-lamp  shone 
with  a  futile  bleary  light.  He  extinguished  it 
and  drew  up  the  window-shades.  Sleep  had  re 
freshed  him  and  he  felt  healthily  hungry.  The 
pain  in  his  leg  returned  with  almost  overwhelm 
ing  force  when  he  attempted  to  walk,  but  a  sharp- 
edged  appetite  impelled  him  to  seek  the  pantry. 
He  found  the  dining-room  wrapped  in  the  same 
somber  stillness  that  it  had  worn  the  night  before, 
the  bowl  of  walnuts  showing  dully  in  the  center 
of  the  table.  From  the  kitchen  table  where  he 
had  set  it  the  night  before  the  empty  wine-glass 
stared  back  at  him.  But  there  was  something  re 
assuring  in  its  presence.  It  seemed  to  give  mute 
evidence  of  the  reality  of  this  adventure. 

From  the  butler's  pantry  Kenwick  brought  a 
can  of  coffee  and  half  a  loaf  of  bread.  "What 
ever  my  bill  in  this  caravansary  amounts  to,"  he 
told  himself  as  he  measured  out  the  coffee,  "it 's 
going  to  include  breakfast.  I  Jve  decided  to  sign 
up  on  the  American  plan." 

On  his  trip  back  to  the  pantry  he  discovered 
upon  the  ledge  inside  the  window  half  a  dozen 
fresh  eggs.  They  gave  him  a  little  shock  of  sur 
prise.  For  he  was  certain  that  they  had  not  been 
there  before.  The  window  was  small  and  narrow, 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    15 

much  too  tiny  to  admit  a  human  body.  But 
whoever  was  detailed  to  take  care  of  this  place 
was  apparently  on  the  job.  Ken  wick  resolved 
to  be  on  the  alert  for  the  egg-hunter.  In  twenty 
minutes  he  had  cooked  himself  an  ample  break 
fast  and  carried  it  into  the  dining-room  on  an 
impressive  silver  tray.  Memories  of  long-ago 
camping  trips  with  his  elder  brother  in  the 
Adirondacks  recurred  to  him  as  he  ate.  Everett 
was  a  master  camper  but  had  always  hated  to 
cook.  In  order  to  even  things  he  had  been 
willing  to  do  much  more  than  his  share  of  the 
rougher  work.  Now  as  Kenwick  drank  his  coffee 
and  ate  the  perfectly  browned  toast  and  fluffy 
eggs,  he  blessed  those  camping  trips  and  the  edu 
cation  which  they  had  given  him. 

And  then  his  memory  wandered  from  the 
wholesome  sanity  of  those  days  to  the  first  dread 
ful  months  of  the  war.  From  the  chaos  of  that 
era,  one  night  leaped  out  at  him.  It  was  the  night 
that  he  had  parted  with  Everett  at  the  old  Ken- 
wick  house,  the  house  that  had  been  the  Kenwicks' 
for  sixty  years.  Perhaps  the  stark  simplicity  of 
that  scene,  shorn  of  objective  emotion  by  the  pres 
ence  of  Everett's  wife,  was  the  very  thing  that 
enabled  him  now  to  extricate  it  from  the  tangle  of 
days  that  preceded  and  followed  it.  Everett  had 


16    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

laid  his  hand  for  just  an  instant  upon  the  shoulder 
of  the  new  uniform.  "I  'm  all  you  've  got  to  see 
you  off,  boy,"  he  had  said.  "But  if  mother  and 
dad  could  see  you  now  they  'd  be  proud  and 
happy."  And  then  had  followed  a  sentence  or 
two  of  promise,  of  affection,  of  admonition, 
murmured  in  a  hasty  undertone  intended  to  es 
cape  the  ears  of  the  statuesque  creature  who 
was  his  brother's  wife.  Kenwick  had  wondered 
afterward  whether  they  had  escaped  her,  whether, 
anything  vital  ever  escaped  Isabel  Kenwick. 
And  yet  his  farewell  to  her  had  been  a  flawless 
scene.  She  was  always  the  central  figure  in  some 
flawless  scene.  His  brother's  whole  life  seemed 
to  him  to  be  enacted  upon  a  perfectly  appointed 
stage.  There  had  been  just  the  proper  proportion 
of  regret  and  pride  in  Isabel's  voice  as  she  bade 
him  good-by;  just  the  right  waving  to  him  from 
the  steps  and  calling  after  him  that  whenever  he 
returned  his  old  room  would  be  waiting  with 
everything  just  as  he  left  it. 

And  then  he  had  come  back  and  not  found  his 
room  the  same  at  all.  Everything  about  the 
house  seemed  changed.  His  room  was  a  guest 
room  now,  and  he  had  been  relegated  to  a  place 
on  the  third  floor  with  dormer-windows.  He 
hated  dormer-windows.  When  his  mother  had 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    17 

been  head  of  the  home  the  third  floor  had  been 
used  only  for  the  servants,  but  under  Isabel's 
regime  it  had  been  converted  into  extra  guest 
rooms,  and  there  seemed  to  be  a  never-ending 
succession  of  guests. 

So  it  had  been  no  hardship  to  acquiesce  in 
Everett's  suggestion  that  he  come  out  to  Cali 
fornia  and  recuperate  from  the  war  strain  in  Old 
Man  Raeburn's  hospitable  Mont-Mer  home.  It 
was  a  splendid  idea  for  Everett  well  knew  that 
the  West  was  more  like  home  to  him  now  than 
New  York.  Mont-Mer  itself  was  unfamiliar,  but 
only  a  few  hours  up  coast  there  was  San  Fran 
cisco.  And  in  San  Francisco  was He  felt 

in  his  pocket.  But  the  slender  flat  object  around 
which  his  fingers  had  closed  during  moments  of 
desolation  and  peril  in  the  trenches  was  not  there. 
The  realization  that  it  had  been  pitched  into  the 
underbrush  along  with  his  money  and  watch 
stabbed  him  with  a  new  pain.  Her  picture  out 
there  in  that  canon  where  any  casual  explorer 
might  chance  upon  it !  Why,  it  was  desecration ! 

He  pushed  aside  the  tray  and  went  over  to  the 
long  mirror  in  the  door  of  the  hall  closet.  In  all 
his  twenty-five  years  he  had  never  given  his 
physical  appearance  such  intensive  consideration. 
Vanity  had  never  been  one  of  his  failings.  And 


i8    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

his  fastidious  taste  in  dress  was  more  instinctive 
than  consciously  cultivated.  Now  the  keen  dark 
eyes  traveled  slowly  from  the  brown  hair  brushed 
back  from  his  forehead  to  the  thin  lips  and  firm 
square  chin.  His  eyes  were  the  wide-apart  eyes 
of  the  student  but  it  was  the  nose  that  gave  his 
face  distinction.  Thin,  sensitive,  perfectly 
molded,  it  betrayed  an  eager,  intense  nature  never 
quite  at  peace  with  itself.  The  hands  with  which 
he  tried  now  to  comb  his  disordered  hair  into 
decorum  were  the  long-fingered,  hollow-palmed 
hands  of  those  who  are  blessed  and  cursed  with 
the  creative,  introspective  temperament.  They 
were  hands  impatient  of  detail,  eager  to  grasp 
at  the  garment  of  great  achievement,  resentful  of 
the  slower  process  of  accomplishment.  He  had 
drawn  himself  to  his  full  six  feet.  Army  training 
had  given  him  an  extra  inch,  and  of  this  one 
physical  asset  he  was  proud. 

"Decent  appearing,"  he  mused,  checking  off 
the  credit  side  of  his  ledger  in  businesslike  tones. 
"Fairly  prosperous,  sane,  and  law-abiding.  I 
wonder  if  I  '11  be  able  to  convince  my  host  of  any 
of  those  things." 

He  decided  suddenly  to  explore  the  upper  part 
of  the  house.  It  would  cost  terrific  physical 
effort,  but  a  fury  of  restlessness  possessed  him. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    19 

On  the  broad  landing  the  stairway  divided  and 
took  opposite  ways.  He  turned  to  the  left  and 
a  few  minutes  later  found  himself  standing  in  the 
open  doorway  of  what  appeared  to  be  an  upstairs 
sitting-room.  It  was  obviously  a  man's  apart 
ment.  The  smell  of  stale  cigar  smoke  was  in  the 
air  and  on  the  table  a  pipe  and  ash-tray.  It  was 
the  sight  of  the  latter  that  brought  Kenwick's  fine 
eyes  together  in  a  deep-furrowed  frown.  From 
the  cold  ashes  he  drew  out  a  half-smoked  cigar. 
For  a  long  moment  he  stood  turning  it  in  his 
hand.  It  could  n't  have  been  in  that  tray  for 
more  than  a  few  hours. 

In  the  room  beyond,  separated  from  the  sitting- 
room  by  portieres,  was  a  massive  walnut  bed, 
chiffonier,  and  shaving-stand.  A  blue-tiled  bath 
room  completed  the  suite.  The  windows  of  all 
three  were  closed  and  locked.  He  went  back  to 
the  hall,  past  another  bedroom  with  door  ajar, 
and  descended  the  stairs  to  the  landing.  Here  he 
paused  to  rest,  gazing  speculatively  at  the  closed 
portals  in  the  opposite  wing. 

"The  modern  American  home,"  he  decided. 
"He  has  one  part  of  the  house  and  she  has  the 
other." 

His  face  twitched  with  the  pain  of  his  pil 
grimage.  It  was  going  to  be  a  crucial  experience 


20    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

getting  downstairs.  While  he  stood  there  almost 
despairing  of  the  feat  of  covering  the  distance 
back  to  the  den,  there  came  to  his  ears  a  sound 
that  turned  him  cold.  He  forgot  his  pain  and 
clung  to  the  supporting  post  motionless  as  a 
statue. 

The  sound  came  again.  He  knew  this  time 
that  it  was  not  the  hallucination  of  overstrung 
nerves.  Dragging  himself  up  by  the  banister,  he 
knocked  on  the  first  door  of  the  right  wing. 
There  was  no  response.  He  knocked  again,  then 
boldly  turned  the  knob.  The  door  was  locked. 
But  through  the  deathly  stillness  there  came, 
after  a  moment's  pause,  the  sound  that  he  had 
heard  before.  It  was  the  sound  of  a  woman's 
stifled  sobbing. 


CHAPTER  III 

KENWICK  stood  outside  the  closed  door,  a 
curious  numbness  stealing  over  him.  Was 
it  possible,  he  asked  himself,  that  there  had  been 
some  one  in  this  house  during  the  last  twelve 
hours*?  Was  it  possible  that  this  person  was  a 
woman?  A  solitary  woman?  It  was  unmistak 
ably  a  woman's  voice,  and  there  was  no  sound 
of  comforting  or  upbraiding  or  other  evidence  of 
companionship.  As  he  knocked  again  at  the  door 
he  wondered  which  one  of  them  was  the  more 
startled  by  the  presence  of  the  other. 

The  sobbing  had  abruptly  ceased.  There  was 
dead  silence.  Had  he  been  of  a  superstitious 
temperament  he  might  have  suspected  that  his 
knock  had  somehow  released  from  bondage  an 
unhappy  ghost  who,  wailing  over  a  dead  tragedy, 
had  vanished  leaving  this  spectral  house  as  deso 
late  as  he  had  found  it. 

But  Kenwick  had  no  patience  whatever  with 
the  occult.  For  him  life  was  too  all-absorbing 
and  vivid  an  enterprise  to  tolerate  the  pastel 
existence  of  ghosts.  Through  the  stillness  his 

21 


22    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

voice  cut  its  way  like  a  torchlight  cleaving  a  path 
through  a  blind  alley. 

"What's  the  matter?' 

As  he  hurled  this  question  through  the  panel, 
he  reflected  that,  being  a  woman,  she  would  prob 
ably  reply,  "Nothing."  But  there  was  no  re 
sponse.  Kenwick  persisted.  "Can  I  do  anything 
for  you  ?"  And  then  a  voice  that  was  little  more 
than  a  whisper  came  to  him. 

"Who  are  you?" 

Conscious  that  the  name  would  mean  nothing 
to  her,  he  gave  it  with  a  touch  of  irritation.  She 
must  know  that  he  could  n't  explain  his  invasion 
of  her  house  through  that  inscrutably  closed  door. 
He  had  never  thought  of  the  place  as  belonging 
to  a  woman.  Nothing  that  he  had  seen  in  it  so 
far  bespoke  a  woman's  presence.  The  embarrass 
ment  that  he  had  felt  during  the  first  hours  of  his 
imprisonment  ebbed  back  and  for  the  moment 
robbed  him  of  further  speech. 

"Please  go  away."  The  voice  from  the  other 
side  of  the  door  was  entreating.  It  was  a  cul 
tured,  beautifully  modulated  voice  struggling 
against  heavy  odds  for  composure.  Kenwick  had 
the  feeling  that  it  was  a  voice  that  lent  itself 
easily  to  disguise. 

"I  can't  go  away  until  I  have  told  you  about 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    23 

myself,"  he  said  firmly.  "I  must  tell  you  how 
I  happen  to  be  here,  an  uninvited  guest  in  your 
house."  He  gave  her  the  story  briefly  and  was 
horribly  conscious  that  it  lacked  conviction.  In 
his  own  ears  it  sounded  like  the  still-born  narra 
tive  of  a  debauchee.  Having  stumbled  to  the 
end  he  waited  for  her  comment.  It  came  after  a 
long  pause. 

"I  'm  sorry  you  're  hurt.  I  hope  you  Jll  feel 
better  to-morrow."  To-morrow !  Did  she  expect 
him  to  prolong  his  visit  indefinitely'?  The  casual 
courtesy  of  her  tone  was  more  disconcerting  than 
indignation  or  resentment  or  any  other  form  of 
reply  could  have  been.  But  he  resolved  savagely 
not  to  leave  that  door  until  he  had  obtained  some 
sort  of  information. 

"When  I  met  with  the  accident  I  was  driving 
out  to  the  Raeburn  house ;  Charles  Raeburn.  Do 
you  know  where  he  lives?" 

"No." 

"Well,  tell  me  about  this  place,  then,  please. 
Whose  is  it?" 

"I  don't  know." 

"You  don't  know?  And  yet  you  live  here?" 
Kenwick  felt  as  though  his  brain  were  turning 
over  in  his  head. 

"If  you  call  this  living."    He  would  n't  have 


24    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

caught  this  reply  at  all  if  his  ear  hadn't  been 
pressed  close  against  the  panel. 

"Are  you  all  alone  here*?" 

There  was  no  reply. 

"Is  any  one  with  you*?" 

"Oh,  please  go  away.  Do  have  pity  on  me 
and  go  away." 

She  was  alone,  Kenwick  decided,  and  was 
afraid  to  tell  him  so.  The  realization  brought  a 
wave  of  hot  color  to  his  face.  He  dragged  him 
self  painfully  back  to  the  landing.  And  from 
that  distance  he  sent  his  voice  up  to  her, 
freighted  with  reassurance. 

"Don't  be  frightened.  I  'm  pretty  badly 
bunged  up  just  now,  but  I  found  a  revolver  over 
in  the  other  wing,  and  if  anybody  comes  prowling 
about — well,  I  'm  not  a  bad  shot."  Suddenly  a 
new  thought  occurred  to  him.  "Have  you  had 
anything  to  eat  this  morning*?  Are  you  hungry?" 

"I  think — I  am  starving." 

It  was  like  a  spray  of  ice-water  in  his  face.  He 
stood  for  a  moment  considering,  "I  '11  get  you 
something,"  he  promised.  "If  you  don't  want 
to  come  out  I  '11  fix  it  and  bring  it  up  on  a  tray." 

"There  would  be  no  use." 

"Why  not?" 

"Because  I  can't  open  the  door." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    25 

"Are  you  in  bed?"    His  voice  had  sharpened. 

Silence  again,  from  which  he  concluded  that 
she  was.  He  stood  there  staring  at  the  heavy 
mahogany  door  as  though  by  the  mere  intensity 
of  his  gaze  he  could  dissolve  it.  For  a  long  mo 
ment  he  was  lost  in  thought,  but  he  was  not 
trying  now  to  solve  the  riddle  of  the  woman  on 
the  other  side  of  the  barrier.  The  needs  of  the 
immediate  present  were  all  that  concerned  him. 
Finally  he  spoke  again. 

"Is  your  bed  anywhere  near  a  window?" 

"Yes." 

"Is  the  window  open?" 

"Yes." 

"Then  listen.  I  '11  go  downstairs  and  get  some 
thing  for  you  to  eat.  I  '11  put  it  into  a  bucket, 
attach  some  kind  of  rope  with  a  weighted  end  to 
it,  and  throw  the  end  in  at  your  window.  I  can't 
get  outside  so  I  '11  have  to  do  it  from  the  pantry 
window  and  it  may  take  some  time,  but  I'll  keep 
at  it.  When  the  end  comes  in,  pull  up  the  bucket. 
Do  you  see?" 

"I  '11  try  to." 

He  turned  away  and  began  the  long  trip  down 
to  the  kitchen.  Now  that  he  was  animated  by 
a  desire  to  help  somebody  else,  the  depression 
which  had  enveloped  him  was  momentarily  dis- 


26    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

sipated.  In  spite  of  the  ever-present  pain  he  felt 
almost  elated  when  at  last  he  arrived  again  in 
the  kitchen. 

Half  an  hour  later  the  "rope,"  manufactured 
from  several  towels  tied  together,  with  a  potato- 
masher  on  the  end,  flew  in  at  the  window  just 
above  the  pantry  and  the  carefully  covered 
bucket  disappeared  from  sight.  "Pretty  neat," 
Kenwick  remarked  to  himself.  "I  had  no  idea 
that  I  could  do  it  when  I  told  her  I  would." 

But  the  strain  had  been  too  great.  He  was 
suddenly  aware  that  every  nerve  in  his  body  was 
aching.  Back  in  the  den  he  sank  down  on  the 
couch  where  he  had  spent  the  night.  Conjecture 
about  the  woman  upstairs  was  submerged  now 
beneath  his  own  physical  misery.  The  shelves  in 
the  library  were  empty.  There  was  nothing  to 
read  save  a  paper-backed  copy  of  one  of  Dumas' s 
earlier  novels,  which  he  discovered  in  a  corner. 
He  took  it  up  and  tried  to  lose  himself  in  the 
story,  but  it  could  n't  hold  him.  He  found  him 
self  wondering  resentfully  why  old  man  Raeburn 
had  n't  shown  more  interest  in  his  non-appearance. 
He  was  furiously  impatient  and  utterly  helpless. 
And  he  told  himself  that  these  two  cannot  live 
long  together  without  wrecking  the  reason. 
Never  before  in  his  life  had  he  been  in  a  position 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    27 

where  he  could  n't  do  something  to  alter  obdurate 
circumstance.  To  do  anything  would  be  better 
than  to  do  nothing.  The  thought  came  to  him 
all  at  once  that  this  was  what  women,  overwhelm 
ing  numbers  of  women,  must  have  endured  during 
the  terrible  years  of  the  war  just  past.  There 
must  have  been  whole  armies  of  them,  furiously 
eager  to  shoulder  guns  and  march  away  to  the 
trenches  with  the  men  they  loved.  And  instead 
they  had  to  submit  to  being  caged  up  in  houses 
and,  blindfolded  to  all  vision  of  the  outer  world, 
perform  day  after  day  the  dreary  treadmill  duties 
of  routine  existence.  For  the  first  time  he  found 
himself  wondering  why  more  of  them  had  n't 
gone  insane  under  the  pressure.  He  was  certain 
that  he  himself  would  lose  his  mental  balance  if 
the  blindfold  was  n't  soon  removed  from  his 
mental  vision. 

Suddenly  he  sat  up  and  tossed  aside  his  book. 
There  was  the  sound  of  a  footstep  on  the  gravel 
walk  at  the  other  side  of  the  house.  Pushing  a 
chair  before  him  he  followed  the  sound  out  to 
the  dining-room.  Through  the  window  he  saw 
a  tall,  ungainly  looking  boy  walking  toward  the 
tank-house  garage.  He  was  carrying  a  long  pole 
and  a  pair  of  pruning  shears.  So  this  was  the 
accursed  gardener,  the  mysterious  gatherer  of 


28    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

eggs,  who,  having  brought  him  into  the  house, 
was  content  to  let  him  die  there  or  make  off  with 
the  family  plate. 

"Here,  you!"  Ken  wick  knocked  on  the 
window-pane.  It  was  a  loud  resounding  knock, 
but  the  boy  walked  on  unheeding,  carefully  ex 
amining  one  end  of  his  pole. 

Kenwick  tried  the  lock.  He  had  noticed  in  a 
previous  investigation  that  all  the  windows  on 
the  lower  floor  had  double  locks.  Undoing  them 
on  the  inside  was  futile  until  a  spring  released 
them  on  the  outside.  And  Kenwick  was  in  no 
mood  for  making  mechanical  experiments.  For 
an  instant  he  stood  there,  like  some  caged  animal, 
staring  after  the  gawky  figure  of  the  boy  as 
though  he  were  the  embodiment  of  hope  fading 
away  in  the  distance.  And  then  a  blind  fury 
seized  him.  Possessed  only  of  the  overpowering 
desire  to  gain  the  attention  of  the  outside  world, 
he  suddenly  doubled  his  fist  and  sent  it  crashing 
through  the  heavy  plate-glass  pane.  It  shattered 
into  a  hundred  pieces  and  cut  a  deep  gash  in  his 
wrist. 

When  he  had  bound  this  up  in  a  handkerchief 
with  deft  first-aid  skill,  he  leaned  out  through 
the  ragged  aperture  that  had  been  the  window. 
The  boy  had  vanished  as  completely  as  though 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    29 

he  were  a  wraith.  Kenwick,  controlling  his  dis 
may  with  a  stupendous  effort,  told  himself  that 
he  had  only  gone  to  put  away  his  tools  and  would 
soon  come  running  back  to  investigate  the  dam 
age.  He  stood  there  waiting,  exulting  in  his 
revolt.  In  spite  of  the  lacerated  wrist  this  violent 
assertion  of  his  rights  brought  an  immense  relief. 
Why,  a  person  might  be  murdered  in  this  place 
and  it  would  be  days  before  anybody  would  know 
a  thing  about  it. 

The  boy  did  not  return,  and  Kenwick  made 
his  way  back  to  the  den.  It  was  mid-afternoon 
now  and  a  heavy  rain  had  begun  to  fall.  He 
made  no  further  attempt  to  read,  but  lay  on  the 
upholstered  window-seat  trying  to  find  some  po 
sition  that  would  be  bearable.  He  cursed  him 
self  for  having  used  the  leg  so  much.  Had  he 
remained  quiet  all  day  he  might  by  now  have 
been  able  to  get  away  from  this  uncanny  place. 
But  the  woman  upstairs !  He  could  n't  throw  off 
an  absurd  sense  of  responsibility  concerning  her. 
From  all  that  he  could  gather  she  was  as  helpless 
a  puppet  in  the  hands  of  fate  as  he.  But  of  course 
she  might  have  been  lying  to  him.  As  he  lay 
there  on  his  back  gazing  out  at  the  needles  of 
rain  driven  aslant  into  the  dank  ground,  he  felt 
distrustful  of  the  whole  universe.  Could  there 


30    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

be  any  way,  he  wondered,  of  getting  a  message 
out  of  this  house?  There  must  be  a  rural  de 
livery,  and  if  so,  at  the  gate  would  be  a  letter 
box.  But  that  gate It  seemed  tortuous 

miles  away. 

A  search  through  the  empty  drawers  of  the 
desk  revealed  several  loose  sheets  of  tablet-paper 
and  the  stub  of  a  pencil.  With  this  equipment 
he  wrote  out  a  telegram  to  Everett.  The  mere 
wording  of  it  seemed  to  reinstate  him  somehow 
in  the  world  of  affairs.  The  problem  of  getting 
it  into  the  office  could  be  solved  later. 

At  six  o'clock  he  forced  himself  to  go  out  to  the 
kitchen  again  and  prepare  supper.  The  thought 
of  eating  revolted  him,  but  the  woman  upstairs, 
liar,  decoy,  or  invalid,  must  be  fed.  Dangling 
close  to  the  pantry  window  was  the  white-knotted 
towel  rope  with  the  bucket  on  the  end.  He  put 
into  it  the  last  of  the  loaf  of  bread  and  some 
boiled  eggs.  Then  he  called  to  her  to  pull  it  up. 
When  the  bucket  had  begun  its  erratic  climb,  he 
leaned  out  of  the  narrow  opening  and  spoke  with 
defiant  triumph.  "Did  you  hear  me  smash  that 
window  this  afternoon?  I  was  trying  to  get  the 
attention  of  the  gardener.  And  I  'm  going  to 
get  it  too  if  I  have  to  smash  up  everything  on  this 
place." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    31 

If  she  made  any  reply  he  did  not  catch  it.  The 
rain  was  falling  fast  now  and  there  was  the 
growling  sound  of  approaching  thunder.  Back 
in  the  den  again  he  turned  on  the  reading-light, 
more  for  companionship  than  illumination. 
Could  it  be  possible  that  he  would  have  to  spend 
another  night  in  this  ghostly  house*?  The  idea 
was  intolerable,  and  yet  there  was  no  relief  in 
sight. 

Another  hour  passed,  and  darkness  enveloped 
the  world  in  a  shroud-like  mantle.  The  bandage 
with  which  Kenwick's  leg  was  wrapped  was  a 
torture  now.  He  unwound  it  and  began  to  mas 
sage  the  badly  swollen  limb  using  the  long  firm 
strokes  that  he  had  learned  from  the  athletic 
trainer  during  his  university  days.  They  seemed 
to  ease  the  pain  somewhat  and  he  continued  to 
rub  until  his  arms  ached  with  the  effort. 

Then  all  at  once  there  came  to  his  ears  a  sound 
that  made  him  halt,  every  muscle  tense  with  lis 
tening.  It  was  a  sharp  incisive  knocking  and  it 
seemed  to  come  from  the  dining-room.  He  sat 
motionless,  afraid  to  move  lest  it  should  stop. 
But  it  came  again,  a  clear  unmistakable  knocking 
that  had  the  dull  resonance  of  metal  clashing 
against  metal.  To  Kenwick  it  was  perfectly  ob 
vious  now  that  someone  was  trying  to  gain  en- 


32    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

trance  at  that  broken  dining-room  window.  He 
tested  his  unbandaged  foot  upon  the  floor  and 
drew  himself  stealthily  to  a  standing  position. 
And  then  he  turned  himself  slowly  in  the  direc 
tion  of  the  darkened  dining-room. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE  MORGAN  home  on  Pine  Street  was  a 
rambling  old  house ;  the  only  shingle  struc 
ture  in  a  block  of  modern  concrete  apartments. 
To  the  elder  Morgans  it  had  been  the  fulfilment 
of  a  dream;  a  home  of  their  own  in  San  Fran 
cisco.  Clinton  Morgan  had  lived  only  a  year 
after  its  completion,  and  his  widow,  in  spite  of 
the  pressure  of  hard  times  and  the  inadequacy  of 
the  income  which  he  left,  had  resisted  all  tempt 
ing  offers  to  sell  the  old  place  and  had  brought 
up  her  son  and  daughter  with  a  reverence  for 
family  tradition  as  incongruous  to  their  environ 
ment  and  generation  as  was  the  old  shingle  house 
among  its  businesslike  neighbors. 

And  then,  eight  years  after  Clinton  Morgan's 
death,  oil  had  been  discovered  in  his  holdings  over 
at  Coalinga,  and  the  last  year  of  Sarah  Morgan's 
life  had  been  spent  in  affluence.  But  she  had 
never  parted  with  the  old  home.  At  the  end  of 
that  year  she  had  called  Clinton,  Jr.,  then  a 
young  instructor  in  chemistry  at  the  university, 
to  her  bedside  and  laid  a  last  charge  upon  him. 

33 


34    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"Clint," —  Her  voice  held  that  note  of  uncon 
scious  tyranny  that  approaching  death  gives  to 
last  utterances.  For  in  the  moment  of  dissolution 
there  is  not  one  among  us  but  is  granted  the  crown 
and  scepter  of  autocracy.  "Clint,  don't  let  the 
old  place  go.  Fix  it  over  any  way  you  and 
Marcreta  like,  but  keep  it  in  the  family  as  long  as 
you  live." 

"Yes,  Mother." 

"And  Clint,  there  is  something  else." 

"I  know,  Mother.  It  Js  Marcreta.  But  you 
need  n't  worry  about  her." 

"I  don't  believe  in  death-bed  promises.  It 's 
not  right  to  try  to  tie  up  anybody's  future. 

But You  see,  if  she  were  strong  and  well,  I 

wouldn't  be  anxious;  I  wouldn't  say  anything 
but " 

"You  don't  need  to  say  anything,  Mother. 
I  '11  always  look  out  for  her." 

A  white,  blue-veined  hand  stretched  across  the 
counterpane  groping  for  his.  A  moment  later 
Marcreta  was  holding  the  other  and  brother  and 
sister  faced  each  other  alone. 

It  was  about  a  year  after  this  that  Clinton 
Morgan  brought  home  with  him  to  dinner  one 
night  a  young  college  fellow,  just  on  the  eve  of 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    35 

graduating  from  the  University  of  California. 
The  friendship  between  the  instructor  and  this 
undergraduate,  five  years  his  junior,  had  begun 
in  the  fraternity-house  where  Clinton  dined  oc 
casionally  as  one  of  the  "old  men."  And  tem 
peramental  congeniality  and  diversity  of  interests 
had  done  the  rest. 

"He  's  slated  to  be  one  of  those  writer  freaks." 
Thus  he  introduced  the  guest  to  his  sister.  "But 
he  's  harmless  at  present  and  he  's  far  from  home, 
so  I  brought  him  along." 

Roger  Ken  wick  looked  into  Miss  Morgan's 
grave  blue  eyes  and  became  suddenly  a  man.  His 
host,  surveying  him  genially  from  across  the 
meat-platter,  found  himself  entertaining  a 
stranger.  The  gay  persiflage  which  he  had 
known  over  at  "the  house"  was  completely  sub 
merged  under  a  maturity  which  he  had  suspected 
only  as  potential.  In  vain  he  tried  that  form  of 
social  surgery  known  to  hosts  and  hostesses  as 
"drawing  him  out."  He  mentioned  a  clever  poem 
in  the  college  magazine  of  which  Kenwick  was 
editor.  He  began  a  discussion  of  the  approaching 
track-meet  in  which  Kenwick  was  to  support  his 
championship  for  the  hundred-yard  dash.  He 
tried  university  politics  in  which  his  guest  was  a 
conspicuous  figure.  To  all  these  leads  his  fra- 


36   THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

ternity  brother  made  brief,  almost  impatient  re 
sponse.  And  Clinton  Morgan  was  resentfully 
bewildered.  He  experienced  that  cheated  feel 
ing  known  to  any  one  who  has  brought  home  ex 
ultantly  a  clever  friend,  and  then  failed  in  the 
effort  to  make  him  show  off. 

But  he  couldn't  complain  that  Kenwick  was 
tongue-tied.  He  was  talking  earnestly,  but  it  was 
about  future,  not  past  achievement.  Inspired  by 
Marcreta's  sympathetic  interest,  he  unfolded 
plans  of  accomplishment  of  which  until  that 
moment  he  himself  had  been  in  densest  ignorance. 
Clinton  had  seen  other  men  change,  chameleon- 
like,  in  the  presence  of  his  sister,  and  he  found 
himself  wondering  now  as  he  watched  Kenwick 
take  his  headlong  leap  into  the  future,  whether 
it  was  Marcreta's  regal  beauty  which  inspired 
their  admiration  or  her  physical  disability  which 
appealed  to  their  chivalry. 

Kenwick  himself  was  scarcely  conscious  of  the 
disability.  He  was  only  vaguely  aware  that  there 
were  cushions  at  Miss  Morgan's  back  and  that  on 
the  way  in  from  the  living-room  she  had  leaned 
slightly  upon  her  brother's  arm.  When  the  eve 
ning  was  over  he  left  the  Morgan  home  enveloped 
in  a  white  fury. 

"I  've  been  a  fool !"  he  told  himself  violently. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    37 

"I  Jve  been  frittering  away  my  whole  life.  This 
college  stuff  is  kids'  play.  If  I  was  n't  just  two 
months  from  the  end  I  'd  ditch  it  and  break  into 
the  man's  game  of  finding  a  place  in  the  world." 

"Great  chap,  Kenwick,"  Clinton  was  telling 
his  sister.  "But  he  was  n't  quite  himself  to-night. 
I  think  he  has  some  family  troubles  that  worry 
him.  Does  n't  get  on  very  well  with  his  sister- 
in-law  back  East,  I  believe.  That 's  why  he  came 
out  here  to  college." 

Marcreta  made  a  random  reply.  She  was  won 
dering  what  kind  of  person  Roger  Kenwick's  real 
self  was.  And  she  was  soon  to  discover.  For 
that  evening  marked  the  beginning  of  a  new  era 
for  them  both.  Scarcely  a  week  passed  that  he 
did  not  spend  Saturday  and  Sunday  evenings  at 
the  house  on  Pine  Street.  Sometimes  he  read 
aloud  to  her  "stuff"  that  he  had  written  for  the 
local  newspapers.  Sometimes  she  read  to  him 
from  her  favorite  books.  Once  she  helped  him 
plan  the  plot  of  an  absorbing  serial  story.  But 
often  they  didn't  read  anything  at  all;  just  sat 
in  front  of  the  open  fire  and  talked. 

In  May  Kenwick  was  graduated  from  the  uni 
versity,  but  was  still  living  at  the  fraternity- 
house  in  Berkeley  when  there  came  a  sudden  sum 
mons  from  New  York.  He  ought  to  come,  Isabel 


38    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

informed  him,  for  his  brother  was  seriously  ill. 
On  the  night  before  he  left  he  made  a  longer  call 
than  usual  at  the  Morgan  home. 

"Everett's  the  finest  chap  in  the  world,"  he 
told  Marcreta.  "He  's  been  like  a  father  to  me. 

But Lord!  How  I  hate  to  tear  myself 

away  from  here !  And  the  worst  of  it  is,  I  don't 
know  how  long  I  may  have  to  stay.  You  won't 
forget  me  if  it 's  a  long  time?" 

And  then  all  at  once  they  were  not  talking 
about  his  trip  any  more,  nor  of  Everett.  "If  you 
could  only  give  me  some  hope  to  go  on,"  Kenwick 
was  saying.  "Something  to  live  on  while  I  'm 
away." 

But  to  this  entreaty  Marcreta  was  almost 
coldly  unresponsive.  She  tried  evasions  first; 
asked  solicitous  questions  concerning  his  plans; 
showed  a  heart-warming  interest  in  his  anxiety 
concerning  his  brother.  But,  forced  at  length  to 
answer  his  persistent  question,  she  said  simply: 
"No.  I  don't  care  for  you — in  that  way.  Let 's 
not  talk  any  more  about  it.  Let 's  not  spoil  our 
last  evening  together. 

It  brought  him  to  his  feet  white  and  shaken. 
"Spoil  my  last  evening  with  you!"  he  cried. 
"Spoil  my  whole  life!  That's  what  it  will  do 
if  I  can't  have  you  in  it."  His  fingers  sought  an 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    39 

inside  pocket  of  his  coat.  "I  Ve  got  your  pic 
ture,"  he  told  her  fiercely.  "I  got  it  down  at 
Stafford's  studio  the  other  day.  And  I  'm  going 
to  carry  it  with  me  always — until  you  give  me 
something  better." 

A  month  after  his  arrival  in  New  York  he 
wrote  her  that  his  brother  had  recovered  and  that 
he  would  soon  be  coming  back  to  find  a  position 
in  a  newspaper  office  in  San  Francisco.  But  he 
did  n't  come  back.  For  it  was  just  at  this  time 
that  men  began  to  hear  strange  new  voices  calling 
to  them  from  out  of  the  world-chaos.  Day  by  day 
they  grew  in  volume  and  in  authority  luring  youth 
out  of  the  isolation  of  personal  ambition  into  the 
din  and  horrible  carnage  of  war.  Just  before 
he  left  for  a  Southern  training-camp  Kenwick 
wrote  her  a  long  letter.  In  it  there  was  neither 
past  nor  future  tense.  It  concerned  itself  solely, 
almost  stubbornly,  with  the  present. 

On  the  evening  that  she  received  it  Marcreta 
held  conference  with  her  brother  in  the  dignified 
old  drawing-room.  "Clinton,  I  want  to  make  the 
old  house  take  a  part  in  the  war.  I  've  been 
talking  it  over  with  Dr.  Reynolds.  He  says  it 
would  make  an  ideal  sanitarium.  I  want  to  use 
it  for  the  families  of  enlisted  men;  the  women 
and  children,  you  know,  who  are  too  proud  for 


40    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

charity  and  who,  for  just  a  nominal  sum,  could 
come  here  and  get  the  best  treatment.  If  you 
were  at  the  front,  would  n't  it  relieve  your  mind 
to  know  that  somebody  you  loved,  I  for  instance, 
was  getting  the  proper  care  when  I  was  ill,  even 
though  you  could  n't  provide  it  for  me?  I  '11  do 
all  this  out  of  my  own  money,  of  course,  and  keep 
your  room  and  mine,  so  that  this  will  still  be 
home  to  you  when — you  come  back  from  training- 
camp." 

He  stared  at  her  incredulously.  "Why,  how 

did  you What  makes  you  think  that — I'm 

going  away?" 

"I  saw  Captain  Evans's  name  on  that  envelope 
the  other  day,  so  I  wrote  to  him  and  asked  if  you 
had  quizzed  him  about  war  work,"  she  told  him 
shamelessly.  "I  couldn't  help  it,  Clint.  I  had 
to  know.  I  really  knew  anyway.  Knowing  you, 
how  could  I  help  seeing  that  you  were  mad  to 
get  away  and  help.  Every  man  must  be.  But 
you  've  been  afraid  to  broach  it  to  me." 

In  his  first  moment  of  wild  relief,  he  did'n't 
dare  trust  himself  to  speak.  When  he  at  last 
ventured  a  response  he  plunged,  manlike,  into  the 
least  vital  of  the  two  topics.  "But  you  don't 
quite  realize  what  it  would  mean,  Crete,  tearing 
the  whole  house  up  that  way.  And  the  incessant 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    41 

confusion  of  having  all  those  people  around  would 
be  a  frightful  strain.  With  that  spine  of  yours 

apt  to  go  back  on  you  at  any  time It  is  n't 

as  if  you  were  a  well  woman." 

The  instant  the  words  were  out  he  regretted 
them.  He  saw  his  sister  wince,  but  her  voice  was 
steady  and  eager  with  entreaty.  "That  's  just  it, 
dear.  It  is  n't  as  if  I  were  well  and  could  do  any 
work  myself.  But  I  can  do  this.  I  know  what 
sick  people  need  to  make  them  comfortable.  Oh, 
let  me  do  it,  Clinton." 

He  reached  over  and  patted  her  shoulder.  "I 
don't  want  to  stand  in  the  way  of  anything  that 
would  give  you  any  happiness.  But  if  it  should 
be  too  much  for  you — and  I  so  far  away  from 
you " 

"Even  if  it  should  be,  you  would  come  to  see 
some  day  that  I  was  right  to  do  it.  I  have  a  right 
to  take  that  chance.  I  have  just  as  much  right  as 
a  soldier  has  to  stake  my  life  against  a  great 


cause." 


In  the  end  he  yielded,  and  together  they 
planned  the  readjustment  of  their  lives  and  the 
old  home.  Of  the  rooms  on  the  lower  floor,  only 
the  big  library  remained  unchanged.  But  there 
were  invalid-chairs  ranged  about  the  great  room 
now  and  little  tables  holding  bottles  and  trays. 


42    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

On  the  Sunday  evening  before  he  left  Clinton 
found  his  sister  up  in  her  room  sorting  over  a  pile 
of  letters.  "Well,  your  dreams  are  coming  true, 
Crete,"  he  told  her.  "Dr.  Reynolds  is  delighted 
with  this  place  and — you  're  sending  a  man  to  the 


service." 


She  looked  up  at  him  with  a  smile,  and  it 
flashed  across  him  suddenly  that  she  had  done 
more  than  this.  A  silence  fell  between  them,  the 
tense  throbbing  silence  that  precedes  a  last  fare 
well.  He  felt  that  he  ought  to  say  something; 
something  comforting  and  cheerful.  But  the 
Morgans  were  reserved  people,  and  they  found 
confidences  incredibly  difficult.  So  he  stood  there 
looking  down  at  her,  thinking  that  she  always 
ought  to  wear  that  soft  blue-gray  color  that 
seemed  to  melt  into  her  eyes  and  bring  out  all 
the  richness  of  the  dark  curves  of  hair.  It  was 
so  that  he  would  think  of  her  in  the  days  that  were 
to  come — a  fragile  but  gallant  figure  sitting  at  the 
old  mahogany  desk  sorting  out  letters. 

Suddenly  she  pushed  them  aside  and  rose  to  her 
full  splendid  queenly  height.  She  knew  that 
the  moment  of  farewell  had  come  and  was  not 
grudging  it  its  crucial  moment  of  life.  He  came 
toward  her  and  put  his  two  hands  lightly  on  her 
shoulders.  But  words  failed  him  utterly.  For 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    43 

his  glance  had  fallen  upon  the  pile  of  letters 
which  she  had  tied  with  a  narrow  bit  of  white 
ribbon.  And  he  noticed  for  the  first  time  that 
they  were  all  addressed  in  the  same  handwriting. 


CHAPTER  V 

BEFORE  going  to  investigate  the  knocking 
in  the  dining-room,  Kenwick  picked  up  the 
loaded  revolver  which  he  had  brought  down  with 
him  from  the  upstairs  sitting-room.  He  felt  him 
self  so  completely  at  a  disadvantage  against  any 
chance  invader  that  only  such  a  weapon  could 
even  the  score.  Besides,  there  was  the  sick  woman 
upstairs.  He  had  her  to  protect.  He  hobbled 
across  the  hall,  making  ,as  little  noise  as  he 
could.  But  the  process  of  getting  into  the  dining- 
room  took  considerable  time.  There  was  plenty 
of  time,  he  reflected,  for  the  intruder  to  become 
discouraged  or  emboldened  as  the  case  might  be. 
As  he  crossed  the  room  an  icy  blast  struck  him 
from  the  open  window,  and  he  told  himself 
savagely  that  he  wished  he  had  left  it  alone.  You 
could  n't  expect  a  furnace  to  heat  a  house  with  a 
gale  like  that  blowing  into  it.  He  had  dragged 
himself  to  within  a  few  feet  of  the  pane  when  all 
at  once  he  stopped.  Two  wide  boards  had  been 
nailed  across  the  aperture.  It  was  a  clumsy  job, 
hurriedly  done.  Kenwick  stood  there  gazing  at 

44 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    45 

it.  So  it  was  only  for  this  that  he  had  made  the 
painful  journey  from  the  den !  And  the  carpenter 
was  gone.  The  customary  deathly  stillness  pre 
vailed. 

He  stood  there  listening  for  the  sound  of  re 
treating  footsteps  but  it  was  another  sound  that 
caught  his  ear.  What  he  heard  was  the  far  off 
chugging  of  an  automobile  engine.  He  remem 
bered  now  that  the  place  was  on  a  corner ;  that  he 
had  walked  what  had  seemed  miles  after  turning 
that  corner  before  he  had  come  to  the  iron  gate. 
He  was  thinking  rapidly.  This  was  his  one  hope. 
If  he  could  manage  to  get  out  to  that  gate  by  the 
time  the  motor-car  reached  it,  he  could  get  help. 
How  ill  the  woman  upstairs  might  be  he  could  not 
guess,  but  they  were  both  terribly  in  need  of  aid. 
At  any  cost  he  must  get  out  to  the  road. 

He  laid  the  revolver  upon  a  grim,  high-backed 
chair  and  threw  his  whole  six  feet  of  strength 
against  one  of  the  wide  boards.  It  gave  under  the 
pressure  with  a  long  tearing  noise  and  hung  out 
ward  dangling  from  its  secure  end.  Kenwick 
took  up  the  revolver  again,  worked  himself  out 
through  the  ample  opening,  and  landed  cautiously 
upon  the  gravel  walk  beneath  the  window. 
Clutching  at  the  branch  of  a  giant  oleander  bush 
he  called  up  to  the  patient  upstairs;  "I  'm  going 


46    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

out  to  the  gate.  I  don't  know  what  will  happen 
to  me  before  I  get  back,  and  I  don't  care.  But 
I  'm  going  to  get  help  or  die  trying." 

There  was  no  response.  He  wondered,  as  he 
started  along  through  the  blackness,  whether  the 
woman  could  be  asleep.  How  could  any  one 
sleep  in  this  ghastly  place.  Some  people  did  n't 
seem  to  have  any  nerves.  But  she  might  be 
dead.  The  thought  brought  him  to  an  abrupt 
halt.  But  in  that  case  it  was  more  imperative 
than  ever  that  he  toil  on. 

The  rain  had  stopped  now  and  the  lawn  under 
his  feet  was  soggy  and  water-beaten  like  a  carpet 
that  has  been  left  out  in  a  storm.  He  thanked 
fortune  that  it  was  not  slippery  but  gave  beneath 
his  staggering  tread  with  a  resilience  that  aided 
progress.  It  was  impossible  for  him  to  proceed  at 
anything  faster  than  what  seemed  a  snail's  pace. 
The  machine  must  have  passed  the  gate  by  this 
time,  but  there  would  be  others.  If  he  ever 
reached  that  distant  goal  he  would  stand  there 
and  wait. 

Across  the  circle  of  lawn,  around  the  arc  of 
drive,  he  made  his  laborious  way  with  clenched 
teeth.  And  so  at  last  he  came  to  where  the  tall 
gate  loomed  black  and  forbidding  through  the 
darkness.  The  heavy  chain  still  swung  its  sinister 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    47 

scallop  before  it,  seeming  more  like  a  prison  pre 
caution  now  than  a  warning  against  invasion.  As 
he  looked  at  the  stone  fence,  stretching  away  from 
it  on  both  sides,  and  recalled  the  agony  with 
which  he  had  scaled  it,  courage  fled.  He  'd 
rather  die,  he  decided,  than  attempt  to  struggle 
over  that  parapet  again.  So  he  stood,  supporting 
himself  by  one  of  the  iron  rods  of  the  gate,  listen 
ing  for  the  sound  of  an  engine.  It  came  at  last, 
growing  louder  as  the  car  turned  the  corner  a 
quarter  of  a  mile  away.  It  was  evidently  travel 
ing  slowly  in  low  gear.  The  reason  was  soon 
apparent.  Its  engine  was  missing  fire. 

On  through  the  darkness  it  came,  its  lights 
blazing  a  path  for  its  faltering  progress.  There 
was  a  noise  of  violently  shifted  gears  and  then 
the  heavy,  greasy  odor  of  a  flooded  carburetor. 
Behind  the  lights  there  slid  into  view  almost 
opposite  the  tall  gate  a  high-powered  roadster.  A 
man  wearing  huge  glasses  that  gleamed  through 
the  dark  like  the  eyes  of  some  superhuman  being 
sprang  out  and  wrenched  open  the  engine  hood. 

For  a  moment  Kenwick  watched  him,  dread 
ing  to  speak  lest  the  stranger  vanish  and  leave 
him  solitary  as  the  gardener  had  done.  And  then 
abruptly  he  sent  his  voice  hurtling  through  the 
night.  At  sound  of  it  he  recoiled.  Only  those 


48    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

who  have  suffered  in  solitude  the  agony  of  a 
nameless  terror  know  the  ghastly  havoc  that  it  can 
work  upon  the  human  voice.  Kenwick's  held  now 
a  harsh,  ugly  tone  that  had  in  it  something  like 
a  threat.  The  man  at  the  engine  wheeled  about 
and  leveled  his  huge  eyes  at  the  spot  from  whence 

the  summons  came.  "What  the  devil ?" 

he  began. 

And  then  explanations  tumbled  through  the 
barred  gate  in  an  incoherent  torrent.  They  left 
the  motorist  with  a  confused  impression  of  an 
automobile  tragedy,  a  bed-ridden  woman,  a 
feeble-minded  gardener,  and  a  haunted  house. 

In  sheer  perplexity  he  began  drawing  off  his 
heavy  gantlet  gloves  as  though  to  prepare  for  ac 
tion.  "Take  it  slower,"  he  advised.  "I  don't 
get  you."  And  then  he  noticed  that  the  man  on 
the  other  side  of  the  gate  was  hatless  and  without 
an  overcoat.  "My  Lord!"  he  cried  anxiously. 
"You  '11  freeze  out  here,  man!" 

"Then  for  God's  sake  come  in  here  and  help 
me!"  Kenwick  entreated.  "I  don't  know  whose 
place  this  is  but  it  ought  to  be  investigated. 
There  Js  a  woman  in  here  who  's  ill,  and  somebody 
has  locked  her  into  her  room.  I  'm  not  able  to  do 
a  thing  for  her  or  for  myself.  Do  you  know  what 
house  this  is4?" 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    49 

The  stranger  shook  his  head.  "No,  I  'm  just 
out  here  on  a  visit."  Kenwick  groaned.  There 
flashed  into  his  mind  the  stories  of  some  of  his 
friends  who  had  toured  California  and  who  were 
unanimous  in  their  conclusion  that  everybody  in 
the  southern  part  of  the  state  was  merely  a  visitor. 
"But  whom  do  they  visit?"  Everett  Kenwick  had 
once  inquired  and  nobody  could  supply  him  with 
an  answer. 

"Then  you  don't  know  where  the  Raeburn 
house  is?"  the  man  inside  the  gate  asked  hope 
lessly. 

The  motorist  shook  his  head  again.  "I  '11  tell 
you  what  though,"  he  suggested. .  "You  get  back 
into  the  house  out  of  this  cold  and  I  '11  send  some 
body  back  here.  I  'm  having  engine  trouble  and 
I  've  got  to  get  into  town." 

Kenwick  was  fumbling  with  numb  fingers  in 
the  pocket  of  his  coat.  He  stretched  an  oblong 
of  white  paper  through  the  bars  of  the  gate.  "If 
you  're  going  in  town,  take  this,"  he  pleaded. 
"It  5s  a  message  I  want  to  send  to  my  brother  in 
New  York.  Kenwick  is  the  name  and  the  ad 
dress  is  on  the  outside." 

The  stranger  stopped  on  his  way  to  the  gate 
and  a  curious  expression  crossed  his  face.  And 
just  at  that  moment  Kenwick  caught  the  sound  of 


50    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

another  voice  speaking  from  inside  the  car.  He 
could  n't  catch  the  words,  for  the  coughing  of 
the  engine  beat  against  his  ears.  The  man  in  the 
goggles  climbed  to  the  seat  and  the  next  minute 
the  machine  was  moving  jerkily  away. 

Cold  desolation  seized  Kenwick.  But  he  felt 
certain  that  the  stranger  would  return.  There 
was  nothing  mysterious  nor  uncanny  about  him. 
But  how  long  would  he  have  to  wait  there  on  the 
drenched  gravel  before  help  could  get  back  to 
him?  It  wouldn't  do  to  catch  cold  in  that  leg 
and  add  a  fever  to  his  other  troubles.  He  must 
get  back  into  the  house.  Out  there  on  the  bleak 
road  he  thought  longingly  of  its  warm  comfort. 
Everything  that  he  had  done  since  he  came  into 
it  seemed  now  to  have  been  the  wrong  thing.  A 
horrible  sense  of  incompetency,  the  first  that  he 
had  ever  known  in  all  his  vivid,  effective  life, 
surged  over  him.  And  added  to  this  was  a  curious 
sense  of  having  lost  something.  Was  it  Marcreta 
Morgan's  picture  that  he  missed?  He  told  him 
self  that  it  was,  but  he  was  only  half  satisfied 
with  this  assurance. 

Arguing  the  matter  with  himself,  he  had  cov 
ered  half  the  distance  around  the  driveway  when 
suddenly  a  sharp  reverberation  rang  through  the 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    51 

air.    It  was  the  report  of  a  gun.    Almost  immedi 
ately  this  was  followed  by  a  woman's  scream. 

Kenwick  stood  still,  balancing  himself  un 
steadily  upon  his  well  foot.  The  sound  had  come 
from  the  direction  of  the  house.  Did  it  herald  a 
tragedy  or  was  it  merely  a  signal?  Scarcely 
knowing  why  he  did  it,  except  to  relieve  the 
physical  tension  and  to  make  his  presence  known, 
he  gripped  his  own  revolver  and  fired  two  an 
swering  shots  upward  into  the  night. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE  one  idea  which  possessed  Kenwick  after 
dragging  himself  back  through  the  broken 
window  was  to  find  out  if  the  woman  upstairs 
was  safe.  The  journey  out  to  the  big  gate  and 
back  had  consumed  almost  an  hour,  and  as  he 
pulled  himself  in  between  the  wide  board  and 
shattered  glass  he  felt  that  it  must  have  been 
years  since  he  had  gone  on  that  painful  quest. 
He  rested  for  a  few  moments  and  then  went  into 
the  front  hall. 

To  his  amazement  he  found  it  ablaze  with 
light.  Brilliant  too  was  the  living-room  beyond. 
In  the  latter  he  had  never  used  anything  but  the 
shaded  lamp  upon  the  table.  Now  the  chandeliers 
in  the  ceiling  had  been  lighted  from  the  switch 
board  button.  It  was  evident  that  some  one  had 
been  all  over  the  lower  part  of  the  house  while  he 
was  gone.  It  must  have  been  the  woman  upstairs. 
There  was  no  one  else  on  the  premises  except  that 
half-witted  garden  boy. 

Grimly  resolved  to  discover  whether  his  mys 
terious  companion  was  still  concealing  herself 

52 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    53 

behind  locked  doors  or  whether  her  apartment 
had  been  stormed  by  some  prowler  he  made  his 
way  up  to  the  room  in  the  front  of  the  right 
wing.  As  he  approached  it  he  called  to  her 
asking  if  she  was  all  right.  There  was  no  re 
sponse.  He  knocked.  The  sound  echoed  dully 
down  the  handsome  stairway.  Then  in  a  futile 
sort  of  way  he  tried  the  knob. 

This  time  it  yielded  to  his  touch  and  swung 
slowly  open.  For  a  moment  he  hesitated,  dread 
ing  to  snap  on  the  light.  Then  the  stillness  grew 
oppressive.  His  quick,  impatient  fingers  groped 
along  the  wall,  found  the  switch-button,  and 
pressed  it.  The  mysterious  apartment  flashed 
into  sudden  reality. 

Kenwick  looked  about  him,  bewildered.  The 
light  revealed  a  large  handsome  room  furnished 
in  golden  oak.  There  was  a  massive  double  bed, 
bureau,  dressing-table,  and  several  luxurious 
chairs.  A  heavy  moquette  carpet  deadened  every 
footfall,  and  the  rose-colored  draperies  at  the 
windows  admitted  only  a  restricted  view  of  the 
outer  world.  But  it  was  the  condition  of  the 
room,  not  its  furnishings,  that  puzzled  the  man 
upon  the  threshold.  Dust  covered  every  polished 
surface.  The  hearth  was  swept  clean.  There 
had  been  no  fire  on  it  for  months,  perhaps  years. 


54    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

On  the  bed  was  a  mattress  but  no  coverings.  The 
mirrors  on  bureau  and  dressing-table  showed  a 
thin  veil  of  dust.  There  were  no  toilet  articles, 
no  personal  belongings  of  any  kind.  The  room 
was  evidently  a  woman's  but  there  was  no  hint  of 
a  woman's  presence,  except  that  in  the  air  hung 
a  faint  perfume  of  heliotrope.  He  remembered 
suddenly  that  it  was  the  perfume  that  Marcreta 
Morgan  had  always  used. 

Kenwick  went  over  to  one  of  the  chairs  and 
sat  down.  He  felt  intensely  relieved.  If  the 
woman  had  gone  away  she  would  certainly  send 
some  one  back  to  the  house,  for  she  knew  that  he 
was  alone  and  injured.  But  how  had  she  gone*? 
Was  there  another  entrance  to  these  somber 
grounds?  For  half  an  hour  he  sat  there  trying 
to  think  it  out.  The  room  grew  very  cold.  It 
had  apparently  been  shut  off  from  the  furnace 
connection.  He  arose  at  last,  stiffly,  and  went 
back  downstairs,  switching  off  the  lights.  In 
the  living-room  and  hall  he  turned  them  off  too, 
for  they  gave  to  the  solemn  rooms  a  garish,  in 
congruous  splendor. 

He  went  into  the  den  and  took  his  old  place 
on  the  upholstered  window-seat.  It  may  have 
been  twenty  minutes  later  that  he  heard  the  sound 
of  wheels  crunching  the  gravel  of  the  driveway. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    55 

He  listened  intently.  No,  this  time  he  was  not 
mistaken.  Some  vehicle  was  approaching  the 
house.  The  stranger  in  goggles  had  been  true  to 
his  promise  and  had  sent  back  help,  or  perhaps 
returned  himself.  At  last  this  hideous  bondage 
was  to  end.  He  limped  into  the  living-room  and 
without  turning  on  the  light,  peered  out.  There 
was  no  one  in  sight  and  no  sound  of  voices,  but 
at  the  foot  of  the  front  steps  stood  a  long  black 
car.  It  recalled  to  him  in  a  flash  the  beetle-black 
limousine  that  he  had  seen  in  the  tank-house 
garage. 

Impelled  by  his  entry  into  the  room  upstairs 
to  try  the  front  door,  he  turned  the  knob.  It 
was  unlocked.  Whoever  had  come  in  or  gone 
out  had  been  in  too  much  of  a  hurry  to  fasten  it 
this  time. 

And  then,  standing  there  at  that  half -open  door, 
Kenwick  suddenly  lost  his  headlong  impatience. 
For  the  realization  came  to  him  at  last  that  his 
experiences  of  the  last  twenty-four  hours  were 
no  casual  adventure.  This  was  a  game,  perhaps 
even  a  trap.  He  had  inadvertently  stepped  into 
a  carefully  laid  plot.  That  it  had  been  ob 
viously  prepared  for  somebody  else  did  not  alter 
the  seriousness  of  his  present  position..  Whoever 
was  engineering  the  thing  had  assumed  that  he 


56    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

would  do  and  say  certain  things.  And  now,  he 
reminded  himself  angrily,  he  had  probably  done 
and  said  them  all.  Certainly  his  every  move 
had  been  direct,  impetuous,  glaringly  obvious. 
He  would  have  to  change  his  course  unless  he 
wanted  to  die  in  this  accursed  house.  This  game, 
whatever  it  was,  could  n't  be  won  by  throwing  all 
the  cards  face  up  on  the  table  and  demanding 
a  reckoning.  The  other  players  wore  masks.  If 
he  was  to  have  any  chance  against  them  he  must 
adopt  their  tactics. 

He  assured  himself  of  all  this  while  he  limped 
down  the  shallow  porch  steps.  He  had  n't  the 
faintest  notion  of  what  he  was  going  to  do  next, 
but  decided  to  trust  to  impulse.  He  had  reached 
the  lowest  step  when  all  at  once  he  recoiled.  Al 
most  with  his  hand  upon  the  beetle-black  limou 
sine  he  discovered  that  it  was  not  a  limousine  at 
all.  It  was  a  hearse. 

At  that  same  moment,  he  heard,  coming  from 
the  near  distance,  the  voice  of  some  one  speaking 
with  unaccustomed  restraint.  It  was  a  raucous 
voice  talking  in  a  harsh  whisper.  And  then 
there  was  a  sound  of  footsteps  approaching. 

Without  an  instant's  hesitation  Kenwick 
opened  the  door  of  the  hearse,  pulled  himself  in 
side,  and  drew  it  shut,  unlatched  behind  him. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    57 

There  was  no  definite  plan  in  his  mind  except  to 
escape.  And  the  woman  had  apparently  fled  so 
he  felt  no  further  responsibility  for  her. 

The  steps  came  nearer.  In  another  minute 
some  one  might  jerk  open  the  door  and  discover 
him.  And  he  remembered  uneasily  that  now  he 
was  not  armed.  He  had  left  the  revolver  on  the 
table  in  the  den.  The  footsteps  stopped  close  to 
his  head  and  a  man's  voice  called  to  somebody 
at  a  distance. 

"My  orders  was  to  come  out  here.  That's  all 
I  know  about  it.  But  I  'm  not  goin'  to  get  myself 
tied  up  in  any  mess  like  this.  It  's  up  to  the 
coroner  first.  It  just  means  that  I  '11  have  to 
make  another  trip  out  here  to-morrow." 

Kenwick  heard  him  clamber  to  the  high  seat, 
and  heard  him  jam  his  foot  against  the  starter, 
heard  its  throbbing  response.  And  then  he  started 
away  on  his  long  weird  drive  through  the  black 
night. 

He  had  expected  his  conveyance  to  be  almost  as 
close  and  stifling  as  a  tomb,  but  was  relieved  to 
find  that  sufficient  air  came  in  through  the  crack 
of  the  door  to  make  the  trip  endurable.  The 
only  provident  thing  that  he  had  done  during  the 
whole  adventure,  he  decided,  was  to  put  on  his 
overcoat  and  hat  before  leaving  the  den.  One 


58    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

journey  bareheaded  into  the  November  night  had 
been  sufficient  to  warn  him  against  a  repetition 
of  such  rashness.  He  was  dressed  now  as  he  had 
been  when  he  first  took  stock  of  himself  outside 
the  tall  iron  gate. 

The  road  was  smooth  asphalt  all  of  the  way, 
and  the  passenger,  stretched  at  full  length  on 
the  hard  floor  of  the  hearse,  felt  more  comfortable 
than  he  had  all  that  ghastly  day.  During  the 
ride  he  tried  to  formulate  some  definite  course 
of  action.  For  now  that  the  solitary  desolation 
of  the  last  twenty-four  hours  was  ended,  he  was 
able  to  detach  himself  from  its  events  and  to  view 
the  whole  experience  as  a  spectator. 

His  vivid  imagination  pictured  the  somber 
house  in  a  dozen  different  lights.  But  he  dis 
carded  them  one  by  one,  and  his  interest  centered 
about  the  identity  of  the  woman  upstairs  and 
the  single  shot  which  had  pierced  the  stillness  of 
a  few  hours  before.  Of  only  one  thing  he  was 
certain — that  he  was  going  to  get  out  of  Mont- 
Mer  as  speedily  as  possible.  It  was  all  very  well 
to  conjecture  that  the  house  might  be  the  dis 
reputable  retreat  of  some  Eastern  capitalist,  or 
a  rendezvous  for  radicals,  but  he  preferred  to 
solve  the  riddle  from  a  distance.  He  had  no 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    59 

intention  of  being  called  as  a  witness  in  an  ugly 
expose.  It  would  be  easy  enough  to  write  to  Old 
Man  Raeburn  and  explain  that  it  had  n't  been 
possible  for  him  to  stop  off  on  his  way  to  San 
Francisco.  He  fervently  hoped  that  he  would 
never  see  Mont-Mer  again.  Without  ever  hav 
ing  really  seen  it  he  had  come  to  loathe  it. 

He  had  ridden  for  twenty  minutes  or  more 
when  he  felt  the  vehicle  slow  down.  It  made  a 
sharp  turn  and  came  to  a  stop.  Kenwick  won 
dered  if  the  driver  would  open  the  doors,  and  he 
lay  there  waiting,  staring  into  the  dark,  impassive 
in  the  hands  of  fate.  He  heard  the  man  climb 
down  from  his  seat  and  then  the  sound  of  his  foot 
steps  growing  fainter  in  the  distance. 

Ten  minutes  later  Kenwick  cautiously  pushed 
open  the  flimsy  doors  and  worked  himself  out  of 
his  hiding-place.  He  was  in  an  alley  enclosed 
on  three  sides  by  the  backs  of  buildings.  Half 
hopping,  half  crawling  he  reached  the  dimly 
lighted  street.  It  was  almost  midnight  now  and 
the  little  town  was  deserted.  At  the  corner  he 
found  a  drug-store.  It  looked  warm,  companion 
able,  inviting.  Drawing  his  fur-collared  overcoat 
about  his  ears  he  hobbled  to  the  door  and  pushed 
it  open. 


60    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Inside  two  men  were  leaning  against  a  glass 
show-case  talking  with  the  clerk.  At  Kenwick's 
entrance  the  conversation  stopped  abruptly  like 
the  dialogue  of  movie  actors  when  the  camera 
clicks  the  scene's  end.  The  intruder,  clutching 
at  one  of  the  show-cases  for  support,  forced  a 
comradely  smile.  "If  I  can't  put  one  over  here," 
he  told  himself,  "I  don't  deserve  to  be  called  a 
fiction- writer." 

But  before  he  had  time  to  speak  one  of  the 
men  came  forward  with  a  startled  questioning. 
"You  look  all  in,  man ;  white  as  a  sheet.  Sit  down 
here.  What's  the  idea?" 

"Pretty  close  call,"  Kenwick  told  him.  "A 
fellow  in  a  car  bowled  me  over  as  I  was  crossing 
the  street.  He  went  right  on,  but  I  doubt  if  I  '11 
be  able  to  for  a  while." 

"Well,  what  do  you  know  about  that?"  the 
drug  clerk  challenged,  as  he  helped  his  visitor 
into  a  chair  behind  the  prescription-desk.  "Say, 
this  is  gettin'  to  be  one  of  the  worst  towns  on  the 
coast  for  auto  accidents.  Did  n't  get  his  number, 
I  suppose?" 

"No.  And  I  'm  just  a  stranger  passing  through 
here.  I  don't  know  many  people." 

"Hard  luck."  It  was  evident  that  the  trio  were 
disappointed  in  the  meagerness  of  his  story.  One 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    61 

of  them  stooped  and  was  probing  the  swollen  leg 
with  skilful  fingers.  Kenwick  winced. 

"You  Ve  got  a  bad  sprain  there  all  right,"  the 
doctor  told  him.  "It 's  swollen  a  good  deal,  too, 
for  being  so  recent.  Have  you  walked  far4?" 

"Yes,  rather."  Kenwick  watched  in  silence 
while  the  physician  bound  up  the  injured  mem 
ber  in  a  stout  bandage.  In  spite  of  his  best  efforts 
one  sharp  moan  escaped  him. 

"Your  nerves  are  badly  shaken,  I  can  see  that," 
the  doctor  decided.  "Fix  him  up  a  little  bromide, 
Gregson." 

Kenwick  took  the  glass,  furious  to  note  that  it 
trembled  in  his  hand.  The  druggist  attempted  to 
joke  him  back  to  normal  poise.  "A  little  more 
of  a  jolt  and  you  'd  have  had  to  pass  him  up 
to  Gifford,  Doc.  GifTord,  here,"  he  went  on  by 
way  of  introduction,  "is  shipping  a  body  north 
to-night  on  the  twelve-thirty.  Bein'  two  of  you, 
he  might  have  got  the  railroad  to  give  your  folks 
a  special  rate  if  you  're  goin'  his  way." 

The  patient  evinced  mild  interest.  "San  Fran 
cisco?"  he  inquired.  The  undertaker  nodded. 

"That 's  the  train  I  hoped  to  make,"  Kenwick 
sighed.  "But  my  money  seems  to  have  been 

jolted  out  of  me  and "  He  went  carefully 

through  his  pockets  as  he  spoke.  And  then 


62    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Gifford  came  over  and  stood  beside  him.  "If 
you  don't  mind,"  he  began,  "I  'd  like  to  know 
your  name." 

Kenwick' s  reply  was  glibly  reassuring.  "Ken 
neth  Rogers." 

"Oh!  You  that  young  Rogers  that's  been 
visiting  for  a  few  days  at  the  Paddington  place, 
'Utopia"?"  It  was  the  doctor  who  asked  this 
question. 

Kenwick  nodded  warily. 

The  physician  extended  his  hand.  "I  'm 
Markham.  Had  an  engagement  to  play  golf  with 
you  out  at  the  country  club  this  afternoon.  Aw 
fully  sorry  you  couldn't  make  it  but  I  got  the 
message  all  right  from  your  sister  that  you  were 
having  trouble  with  your  car  out  near  Hillside 
Inn  and  you  could  n't  get  away." 

As  Kenwick  wrung  his  hand  with  easy  cor 
diality  there  flashed  before  his  mental  vision  the 
picture  of  the  wayfarer  in  goggles.  Could  a 
malign  fate  have  trapped  him  into  taking  the 
name  of  that  visitor  to  Mont-Mer,  or  any  visitor, 
who  might  some  day  arise  and  challenge  him? 
He  had  got  to  get  out  of  this  place  before  the 
net  that  the  gods  were  weaving  about  him  should 
bind  him  hand  and  foot. 

"Say,  listen."     Gifford  forced  himself  to  the 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    63 

front  again,  speaking  with  a  mixture  of  eagerness 
and  hesitation.  "If  you  're  goin'  up  to  the  city 

to-night,  I  wonder  if You  see,  it 's  like  this. 

I  've  got  a  big  masonic  funeral  on  here  for  Thurs 
day  morning.  It  '11  be  a  hell  of  a  rush  for  me  to 
get  back  in  time  if  I  have  to  make  this  trip.  But 
I  promised  a  little  woman  that  I  'd  see  personally 
to  this  shipment;  send  a  responsible  party  or  go 
myself.  I  have  n't  got  a  soul  to  send,  but  if 
you " 

Kenwick  shook  his  head.  "I  won't  be  able  to 
leave  now  until  to-morrow.  I  '11  have  to  wait  and 
get  some  money." 

Gilford  waved  aside  the  objection.  "Your 
expenses  will  be  paid,  of  course,  as  mine  would 
have  been.  I  '11  advance  you  the  funds.  And 
you  don't  have  to  do  a  thing,  you  know.  Well- 
man's  man  will  meet  the  train  at  the  other  end. 
Wait  and  see  the  casket  in  his  hands  and  then 
you  're  through." 

He  watched  the  other  man  eagerly.  For  a 
moment  Kenwick  did  n't  trust  himself  to  meet 
his  gaze.  He  hoped  that  he  was  not  betraying 
in  his  face  the  jubilant  conviction  that  his  guar 
dian  angel  had  suddenly  returned  from  a  vacation 
and  had  renewed  an  interest  in  him.  In  order 
not  to  appear  too  eagerly  acquiescent  he  asked 


64    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

casually:  "Who  is  the  fellow?  Or  who  was 
he?' 

"Man  by  the  name  of  Marstan.  He  was  n't 
known  around  here.  His  wife  had  to  come  down 
from  the  city  to  identify  him."  He  glanced  at  his 
watch.  "There  's  just  about  time  to  make  the 
train  now.  I  Jve  got  my  car  outside.  It 's  luck, 
your  stumbling  in  here  like  this.  Sheer  luck." 

"Luck  is  too  mild  a  word  for  it,"  Kenwick  as 
sured  himself  as  he  crawled  into  his  Pullman  a 
few  moments  later.  "It  's  providence,  old  boy. 
That  Js  what  it  is." 

The  bromide  had  begun  to  do  its  work.  And 
his  leg,  properly  bandaged,  gave  him  no  pain. 
Almost  hilarious  over  the  knowledge  that  day 
light  would  find  him  among  familiar  surroundings 
again,  he  fell  into  the  delicious  slumber  that 
follows  sudden  surcease  of  mental  strain. 

When  he  awoke  the  train  was  speeding  through 
the  oak-dotted  region  of  San  Mateo.  He  had 
refused  to  accept  any  expense-money  from  Gifford 
except  enough  for  his  breakfast,  and  after  a  cup 
of  coffee  in  the  diner,  he  sat  gazing  out  of  the 
window,  not  caring  to  open  conversation  with  any 
of  his  fellow-travelers,  completely  absorbed  in 
the  business  of  readjusting  himself  to  this  en- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    65 

vironment  that  he  had  loved  and  from  which  the 
war  had  so  abruptly  uprooted  him. 

It  was  glorious  to  be  back  again,  to  catch  up 
the  loose  threads  of  the  old  life.  And  in  spite 
of  the  stark  bareness  of  winter,  the  landscape 
had  never  seemed  so  appealing.  The  wide  level 
stretches  of  pasture,  cut  by  ribbons  of  asphalt, 
the  prosperous  little  towns  which  the  Coast  Com 
pany's  fast  train  ignored  on  its  thunderous  dash 
northward,  the  children  walking  to  school,  the 
pruners  waving  their  shears  to  him  as  he  sped  by 
— all  these  breathed  a  healthy  normal  living  that 
made  the  neurotic  adventures  of  the  past  day 
seem  remote  and  unreal. 

Under  the  long  shed  of  the  Third  and  Town- 
send  Depot  he  lingered  only  until  he  had  carried 
out  GifTord's  instructions.  Then  he  went  on  down 
the  open  corridor  to  the  waiting-rooms.  Outside 
the  voices  of  taxi-drivers  and  hotel  busmen  made 
the  radiant  winter  morning  hideous  with  their 
cries.  The  waiting-room  was  warm  and  bright. 
There  was  no  better  place,  Kenwick  reflected,  to 
map  out  his  program.  The  air  was  a  tonic,  crisp 
and  tipped  with  frost.  It  was  too  cold  to  be 
without  an  overcoat  and  yet,  if  Everett  did  not 
make  punctual  reply  to  the  message  that  he  was 


66    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

about  to  send,  he  might  have  to  part  with  it  for 
a  time. 

He  found  a  seat  in  a  corner  where  he  would 
be  out  of  the  draft  of  incessantly  opening  doors. 
For  in  spite  of  his  good  night's  sleep  he  felt  weak 
and  a  little  giddy.  Resolving  to  dismiss  the 
past  from  his  mind  and  concern  himself  solely 
with  the  present  was  good  logic,  but  difficult  of 
accomplishment.  First,  and  dominating  all  his 
thought,  was  Marcreta  Morgan.  The  thought  of 
her  brought  him  a  dull  pain.  So  many  letters  he 
had  written  her  since  his  return  to  New  York,  and 
not  one  of  them  had  she  ever  answered.  Once, 
in  vague  alarm,  he  had  even  written  to  Clinton, 
but  there  had  been  no  reply.  And  then  pride  had 
held  him  silent.  So  he  could  n't  go  to  the  house 
on  Pine  Street  now.  He  would  n't  go,  he  decided 
fiercely,  until  he  had  a  decent  position  and  had 
reestablished  himself  in  civilian  life. 

Over  at  the  news-stand  a  girl  was  fitting  pic 
ture  post-cards  into  a  rack.  Kenwick  walked  over 
to  her  and  with  a  part  of  the  change  left  from  his 
meager  breakfast  bought  a  morning  paper.  While 
she  picked  it  off  the  pile  he  stood  twirling  the 
circular  rack  absently  with  one  hand.  The  Cliff 
House,  Golden  Gate  Park,  and  prominent  busi 
ness  blocks  whirled  past  his  eyes,  but  he  was  not 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    67 

conscious  of  them.     He  took  his  newspaper  and 
turned  away. 

Halfway  to  the  door  he  opened  it  and  glanced 
at  the  sensational  menu  spread  out  for  his  delec 
tation  upon  the  front  page.  All  at  once  some 
thing  inside  his  brain  seemed  to  crumple  up. 
The  Cliff  House,  Golden  Gate  Park,  and  tall 
office-buildings  sped  around  him  in  a  circle,  like 
a  merry-go-round  gone  mad.  Somehow  he  found 
his  way  back  to  the  corner  seat  and  sank  into  it. 
And  there  he  sat  like  a  stone  man,  staring  at, 
but  no  longer  seeing,  the  front  page  of  his  news 
paper. 


CHAPTER  VII 

TWO  hours  after  Roger  Kenwick  had  taken 
his  gruesome  departure  from  the  house  of 
the  iron  gate,  a  mud-spattered  car  turned  in  at  the 
side  entrance  to  the  grounds  which  he  had  quitted. 
The  man  behind  the  wheel  drove  recklessly, 
careening  between  the  double  row  of  eucalyptus- 
trees  like  some  low-flying  bird  of  prey  seeking  its 
carrion.  At  the  shallow  front  steps  he  brought 
the  car  to  an  abrupt  halt  as  though  he  had  found 
the  thing  for  which  he  sought.  Tugging  at  his 
heavy  gloves  he  sprang  up  the  steps,  two  at  a 
time.  "Lord!  What  a  handsome  place  this  is!" 
he  muttered.  "What  a  place  for  dinners  and 
dancing — and  love!" 

He  pressed  the  electric  button  and  heard  its 
buzz  pierce  the  stillness  of  the  house.  "It  Js  a 
crime !"  He  was  walking  up  and  down  before  the 
closed  door,  flapping  his  gloves  against  his  chest. 
"It 's  a  crime  for  a  man  to  live  in  a  place  like 
this  alone."  He  pressed  the  button  again,  keep 
ing  his  finger  upon  it  this  time  until  he  felt  cer 
tain  that  its  persistent  summons  must  tear  at 

68 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    69 

the  nerves  of  whoever  was  within.  But  still 
there  was  no  response.  Then  he  tried  the  knob, 
turned  it,  and  went  inside. 

The  house  was  in  complete  darkness.  He  felt 
his  way  along  the  front  hall  until  his  fingers  found 
the  switch-button.  At  the  hat-rack  he  divested 
himself  of  his  heavy  coat,  hat,  and  gloves.  The 
face  which  the  diamond-shaped  mirror  reflected 
was  dark  with  disapproval  and  gathering  anger. 
"Door  unlocked  at  one  o'clock  at  night!  Might 
as  well  leave  a  child  in  charge  of  things !" 

Walking  with  noisy,  impatient  tread,  he  as 
cended  the  stairs,  taking  the  left  flight  on  the 
landing,  and  snapping  on  the  light  in  the  upper 
hall.  The  doors  were  all  closed.  He  turned  the 
knob  of  the  first  one  and  went  in.  The  sitting- 
room  was  in  perfect  order.  He  crossed  it  and  en 
tered  the  alcove  beyond.  It,  too,  was  in  order 
with  fresh  linen  upon  the  bed.  Having  made  a 
tour  of  the  suite  he  came  back  and  stood  beside 
the  center-table  in  the  sitting-room.  A  half- 
burned  cigar  caught  his  eye,  and  he  drew  it  out 
of  the  ash-tray  and  turned  it  speculatively  be 
tween  his  fingers.  Then,  still  holding  it,  he 
visited  the  other  rooms  in  the  left  wing.  They 
were  all  orderly,  silent,  deserted.  Somewhere  in 
his  progress  from  one  to  another  he  dropped  the 


70    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

cigar  stump  and  did  not  notice  it.  Moving  like 
a  man  in  a  dream  he  found  himself  at  last  over 
in  the  right  wing,  standing  outside  a  heavy  ma 
hogany  door.  His  movements  were  no  longer 
speculative.  They  were  nervous  and  jerky  as 
though  propelled  by  a  disabled  engine. 

He  did  not  at  first  try  to  open  this  door  but 
called  in  a  low  uncertain  voice  that  seemed  to 
dread  a  reply,  "Marstan,  are  you  here?"  When 
there  was  no  response  he  tried  the  door  in  a  futile 
sort  of  way  as  though  he  were  expecting  resistance. 
When  it  yielded  to  his  touch  and  he  stood  upon 
the  threshold  the  desolation  of  the  room  seemed 
to  leap  out  at  him.  He  felt  no  desire  to  switch 
on  the  light  here,  but  stood  motionless  in  the  open 
doorway,  transfixed,  not  by  a  sight  but  by  an 
odor. 

"Heliotrope !"  he  muttered  at  last,  and  brought 
the  panel  shut  with  a  jerk.  "Some  woman  has 
been  in  that  room !" 

For  long  moments  he  stood  there  in  the  lighted 
upper  hall.  In  his  face  bewilderment  struggled 
with  alarm.  At  last  he  made  his  way  downstairs 
to  the  living-room  and  on  to  the  den.  Here  he 
stared  long  at  the  half-drawn  shades  and  the 
crumpled  cushions  of  the  window-seat.  Some 
thing  was  gone  out  of  that  room;  something  that 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    71 

was  a  vivid,  vital  part  of  it.  He  could  n't  quite 
determine  what  it  was. 

Over  in  the  dining-room  he  examined  the  bowl 
of  English  walnuts  with  several  empty  shells 
mixed  in  among  them  and  the  nutcrackers  lying 
askew  upon  the  centerpiece.  All  at  once  he 
dropped  these  with  a  crash  that  made  an  ugly 
scar  upon  the  polished  table-top.  His  eyes  had 
fallen  upon  the  wide  board  nailed  across  the 
shattered  window.  He  went  over  and  investi 
gated  it  carefully,  his  quick  eyes  taking  in  every 
detail  of  the  crude  carpentry.  Under  his  touch 
the  sagging  lower  board  suddenly  gave  way  and 
fell  with  a  heavy  thud  to  the  gravel  walk  below. 

The  new-comer  went  back  to  the  front  hall, 
searched  for  an  instant  in  the  pocket  of  his  over 
coat,  and  then,  clutching  a  black  cylindrical  ob 
ject,  he  went  out  of  the  house  and  around  on  the 
dining-room  side.  His  hands  were  trembling  now, 
and  the  path  of  light  blazing  from  the  little  elec 
tric  torch  made  a  zigzag  trail  across  the  dank 
flower-beds.  He  found  the  dislodged  board  lying 
with  its  twisted  nails  sprawling  upward  and 
dragged  it  off  the  path.  As  he  dropped  it  his 
eyes  fell  upon  an  object  lying  beneath  a  giant 
oleander  bush.  At  last  he  knew  what  it  was  that 
he  had  missed  from  the  den.  It  was  the  Indian 


72    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

blanket.  Mystified,  he  bent  down  and  picked  it 
up,  finding  it  heavy  with  the  added  weight  of 
dampness.  The  next  moment  he  gave  a  startled 
cry,  dropped  the  blanket  and  torch,  and  staggered 
back  against  the  wall.  And  the  blackness  of  night 
rushed  over  him  like  a  tidal  wave. 

But  his  was  the  temperament  which  recuperates 
quickly  from  a  shock.  Resourcefulness,  the  key 
note  of  his  character,  impelled  him  always  to  seek 
relief  in  action.  Cursing  the  sudden  weakness  in 
his  knees  which  retarded  haste,  he  strode,  with 
the  aid  of  the  recovered  torch,  toward  a  small 
frame  cottage  in  the  rear  of  the  garage.  Here 
he  rapped  sharply  upon  the  closed  door,  then 
pushed  it  open.  This  room,  too,  was  empty. 
Pointing  the  torch,  like  the  unblinking  eye  of  a 
cyclops,  into  every  corner  of  the  apartment,  he 
made  certain  of  this.  Then  he  drew  a  solitary 
chair  close  to  the  door  and  sat  down,  the  torch 
across  his  knees. 

More  slowly  now  his  glance  traveled  around 
the  room.  The  blankets  upon  the  bed  were  in 
a  disheveled  heap.  There  were  some  soiled  dishes 
upon  the  table,  a  cup  half  full  of  cold  tea,  and 
under  the  small  stove  a  pot  of  sticky-looking  rice. 
The  fire  had  gone  out.  He  crossed  the  room  and 
lifted  the  lid  of  the  stove.  Under  the  white 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    73 

ashes  a  few  coals  glowed  dully.  There  were  no 
clothes  in  the  closet.  It  was  easily  apparent  to 
him  that  the  former  inmate  of  the  room  had  left 
unexpectedly  but  did  not  intend  to  return. 

For  half  an  hour  he  sat  there  motionless.  Then 
he  rose,  pushed  back  the  chair,  and  went  out, 
closing  the  door  behind  him.  Very  deliberately 
he  followed  the  side  path  back  to  the  dining-room 
window.  This  time  he  retained  the  light,  pressing 
one  end  of  it  firmly  with  his  thumb.  The  soggy 
Indian  blanket  he  folded  back,  and,  stooping 
close  to  the  ground,  examined  intently  the  dead 
cold  face  which  it  had  sheltered. 

It  was  the  face  of  a  man,  young  but  haggard. 
The  cheeks  were  sunken,  and  through  the  skin  of 
his  clenched  hands  the  knuckles  showed  white  and 
knotted.  His  hair  was  in  wild  disorder,  but  it 
seemed  more  the  disorder  of  long  neglect  than  of 
violent  death.  The  helpless  shrunken  figure  pre 
sented  a  pitiful  contrast  to  that  of  the  man  who 
knelt  beside  it. 

His  was  a  large,  well-proportioned  frame  that 
suggested,  not  corpulence  but  physical  power. 
His  hands  were  powerful  but  not  thick.  His 
whole  bearing  was  self-assured,  almost  haughty. 
But  it  was  the  eyes,  not  the  carriage,  that  gave 
the  impression  of  arrogance.  They  were  the  clear- 


74    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

est  amber  color  with  a  mere  dot  of  black  pupil. 
Here  and  there  tiny  specks  were  visible  showing 
like  dark  grains  of  sand  in  a  sea  of  brown.  A 
woman  had  once  called  them  "tiger  eyes,"  and 
he  had  been  pleased.  A  child  had  once  described 
them  as  "freckled"  eyes,  and  he  had  been  an 
noyed.  As  he  knelt  there  now,  searching  the  face 
of  the  dead  man,  his  eyes,  under  their  drooping 
lids,  narrowed  to  the  merest  slits.  When  at  last 
he  rose  and  drew  the  blanket  back  over  the  still 
form,  he  moved  with  the  brisk  effectiveness  of 
one  animated  by  definite  purpose. 

First,  he  drove  the  mud-spattered  roadster  into 
the  garage  and  left  it  there  beside  the  beetle-black 
limousine.  Then  he  let  himself  into  the  deserted 
house  again,  went  up  to  the  second  bedroom  in 
the  left  wing,  and  began  sorting  over  some  mis 
cellaneous  objects  from  one  of  the  chiffonier 
drawers.  "Ghastly!"  he  muttered  once.  "Ghastly! 
I  '11  have  to  take  something  to  brace  me  up." 

Back  in  the  dining-room  he  took  one  of  the 
long-stemmed  glasses  from  the  sideboard  and 
poured  himself  a  drink  from  a  bottle  in  the  cup 
board  underneath.  But  first  he  scrutinized  its 
contents  under  the  light.  "Why  did  n't  you  take 
it  all?"  he  inquired  sardonically  of  some  invisible 
being. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    75 

For  a  few  hours  he  slept  with  a  sort  of  deter 
mined  tranquillity.  But  by  eight  o'clock  he  was 
up  and  dressed,  and  a  few  minutes  later  he  an 
swered  a  summons  at  the  front  door.  Swinging 
it  open  he  admitted  a  short  sandy  man  with  the 
ruddy  complexion  of  the  Norsemen.  "I  'm  Anni- 
sen,  the  coroner,"  this  visitor  announced. 

"Yes.  I  was  expecting  you.  Come  in."  The 
other  man  swung  the  portal  wider.  "Doctor 
Annisen,  is  it?" 

The  visitor  nodded  and  stepped  into  the  hall 
that  was  still  dim  in  the  cold  light  of  the  winter 
morning.  He  unwound  a  black  silk  muffler  from 
about  his  throat.  "Devilish  cold,"  he  commented. 
"Devilish  cold  for  a  place  that  advertises  summer 
all  the  year  round." 

His  host  smiled  with  sympathetic  appreciation. 
"California  publicity,"  he  commented,  "is  far  and 
away  ahead  of  anything  that  we  have  in  the  un 
imaginative  East.  My  furnace-man  left  me  yes 
terday  and  I  have  n't  got  around  to  making  the 
fires  myself  yet.  But  let  me  give  you  something 
to  warm  you  up,  doctor." 

While  he  filled  one  of  the  small  glasses  on  the 
buffet,  his  guest  eyed  him  stolidly.  "Still  got 
some  on  hand,  have  you?"  he  said  wjth  a  heavy 
attempt  at  the  amenities.  "Well,  this  would  n't 


76    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

be  a  'bad  place  for  moonshining  out  here.  Guess 
you  could  put  almost  anything  over  without  fear 
ing  a  visit  from  the  authorities." 

There  was  a  moment  of  silence.  "You  've  got 
a  beautiful  place  though,"  he  went  on  at  last. 
"But  Rest  Hollow !  What  a  name  for  it !  Rest ! 
Lord!  Anything  might  happen  out  here,  and  I 
guess  most  everything  has.  I  was  n't  much  surv 
prised  at  the  message  I  found  waiting  me  when 
I  got  back  to  town  this  morning.  I  've  always 
said  that  this  place  fairly  yells  for  a  suicide." 
yr  The  other  man's  eyes  were  fixed  upon  his  face 
%ith  a  curious  intentness.  It  was  as  though  he 
were  deaf  and  were  reading  the  words  from  his 
companion's  lips.  The  coroner  had  raised  his 
glass  and  was  waiting.  "No,  I  don't  drink,"  his 
host  explained.  "Very  seldom  touch  anything. 
I  can't  and  do  my  kind  of  work." 

Annisen  set  down  his  empty  glass.  "I  should  n't 
think  you  could  do  your  kind  of  work  and  not 
drink,"  he  remarked.  "Well,  let 's  get  this  over. 
I  suppose  you  left  everything  just  as  you  found 
it?' 

There  was  the  ghost  of  a  smile  in  his  host's 
eyes.  Glad  he  did  n't  put  that  question  the  other 
way  around,"  he  was  thinking.  "It  would  have 
been  an  embarrassment  if  he  had  asked  if  I  found 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    77 

everything  just  as  I  left  it."  And  then  aloud, 
"Certainly.  I  haven't  touched  anything.  The 
body  is  out  here." 

"Good.  GifTord  sent  his  wagon  out  last  night, 
but  fortunately  his  man  knew  enough  not  to  dis 
turb  anything  until  I  'd  been  out.  Were  you  here 
when  he  came  last  night?" 

"No.    I  did  n't  get  here  till  later." 

The  two  men  crawled  out  through  the  broken 
window  and  in  the  gray  light  of  the  November 
morning  knelt  together  beside  the  still  form  under 
the  Indian  blanket.  Mechanically  the  coroner 
examined  it  and  the  empty  revolver  which  they 
discovered  a  few  feet  away.  But  he  offered  no 
comment  until  he  had  finished.  Then  his  verdict 
was  curt.  "Gunshot  wound  in  the  head,  self- 
inflicted.  When  did  this  happen4?"  He  took  out 
a  small  book  and  noted  down  the  answers  to  this 
and  a  variety  of  other  questions.  Then  he  stood 
for  a  moment  staring  down  at  the  white,  drawn 
face  of  the  dead  man. 

"Young,  too,"  he  murmured.  "But  I  suppose 
it  Js  a  merciful  tiling.  There  was  no  life  ahead 
for  him,  poor  devil." 

They  followed  the  path  around  to  the  front  of 
the  house  where  Annisen's  car  was  waiting.  "Be 
in  to  the  inquest  about  two  o'clock  this  after- 


78    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

noon,"  he  instructed.     "That  hour  suit  you  all 
right,    Mr. ?    Don't   believe    I   know   your 


name." 


"Glover.  Richard  Glover.  I  '11  be  there  at 
two,  doctor." 

Late  that  morning  the  hearse  made  its  second 
trip  out  of  the  side  entrance  of  Rest  Hollow.  A 
mud-splashed  roadster  followed  it.  The  cortege 
had  just  passed  the  last  gaunt  eucalyptus-tree  and 
turned  out  upon  the  public  highway  when  it  was 
halted.  A  man  in  heavy-rimmed  goggles  got  out 
of  his  car  and  made  his  way  across  the  road.  His 
glance  wavered  uncertainly  between  the  driver  of 
the  hearse  and  the  man  in  the  muddy  roadster. 
He  decided  to  address  the  latter. 

"I  heard  the  news  last  night.  It  got  around  the 

neighborhood.  But  I  thought I  did  n't 

know Those  rumors  get  started  sometimes 

with  no  foundation  of  fact.  But  it 's  true  then — 
that  he  is  dead." 

"That  who  is  dead?' 

The  question  seemed  to  be  shot  back  at  him. 
And  he  had  the  uncanny  conviction  that  it 
emanated,  not  from  the  lips,  but  from  the  amber 
eyes  of  the  man  in  the  roadster.  He  stammered 
out  his  reply. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    79 

"Why — I  think  his  name He  told  me 

his  name  was  Kenwick;  Roger  Kenwick,  I  think." 

The  roadster  started  again.  "Yes,  that 's  the 
name.  Did  you  know  him*?" 

"No.  But  wait  a  minute,  please."  The  goggle- 
eyed  man  hurried  back  to  his  own  car  and  re 
turned  with  a  handsome  spray  of  white  chrysan 
themums.  They  were  tied  with  a  broad  white 
ribbon  bordered  with  heliotrope.  "I  'd  like  to 
have  you  take  these  if  you  will."  He  handed 
them  up  to  the  hearse-driver. 

The  man  in  the  roadster  fired  another  question. 
"Your  name,  please*?" 

"They  are  not  from  me.  One  of  the  ladies  in 
the  neighborhood  sent  them.  She  felt  it  was  too 
sad — having  him  go  away  this  way,  all  alone." 
He  went  back  to  his  machine  and  was  soon  lost 
in  the  distance.  And  the  funeral  procession  pro 
ceeded  on  its  way  to  Mont-Mer. 

The  coroner's  inquest  was  brief  and  perfunc 
tory.  Annisen  was  on  the  eve  of  retiring  from 
office  and  seeking  a  more  lucrative  position  in  a 
Middle  Western  city  where  the  inhabitants,  as  he 
contemptuously  remarked,  "were  not  afflicted  like 
this  place  is  with  a  chronic  sleeping-sickness." 

The  jury  returned  the  verdict  that  "the  de- 


8o    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

ceased  came  to  his  death  by  shooting  himself  in 
the  head."  After  they  had  departed,  Gifford 
held  brief  parley  with  the  chief  witness.  "I  sup 
pose  you  '11  attend  to  notifying  the  family*?" 

Richard  Glover  nodded.  And  at  his  direction 
the  haggard  body  was  removed  from  the  cheap 
black  coffin  in  which  it  had  made  the  trip  from 
Rest  Hollow.  Following  Richard  Glover's  in 
structions,  it  was  embalmed  for  the  trip  across  the 
continent.  But  just  as  it  was  ready  for  the  long 
journey,  he  announced  to  Gifford  that  he  had  re 
ceived  orders  from  the  family  to  inter  the  body  in 
the  little  cemetery  of  Mont-Mer.  And  so,  on 
the  following  day,  it  was  taken  to  the  quiet  rest 
ing-place  overlooking  the  sea.  In  the  presence  of 
no  one  except  the  undertaker's  assistants  and 
Richard  Glover  there  was  lowered  into  the  lonely 
grave  a  handsome  gray  casket  with  silver  handles 
and  a  frosted  silver  plate  on  which  was  inscribed 
the  name  "Roger  Kenwick." 


CHAPTER  VIII 

THE  editor  of  the  "San  Francisco  Clarion" 
tilted  his  chair  far  back  and  look  quizzic 
ally  at  the  young  man  sitting  beside  his  desk. 
"Sure  I  remember  you,"  he  remarked.  "Did 
some  Sunday  work  for  us  some  time  ago,  did  n't 
you?" 

"Yes,  a  little  feature  stuff  when  I  was  in  col- 
lege." 

"And  now  you  want  to  go  it  strong,  eh4?  Well, 
we  've  been  rather  disorganized  in  here  since  the 
war.  There  's  been  a  constant  stream  of  reporters 
coming  and  going.  But  things  are  settling  down 
a  little  now  and  we  're  not  taking  on  anybody 
who  doesn't  want  to  stick.  Planning  to  be  in 
the  city  right  along,  are  you*?" 

"Well,  I  '11  be  perfectly  frank  with  you  about 
that.  I  'm  not.  I  've  got  to  go  East  as  soon  as 
I  get  a  little  money.  But  I  'm  not  planning  to 
stay  there.  I  'm  coming  back  for  good  as  soon  as 
I  've  closed  up  my  business." 

"Why  not  close  up  the  Eastern  business  first?" 

"Can't.    It 's  not  ripe  yet."    There  was  a  note 
81 


82    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

of  grimness  in  the  young  man's  voice.  "I  don't 
know  just  when  it  will  be,  either.  But  when  I  do 
go  back,  I  don't  think  it  will  take  me  long  to  finish 
it.  Don't  give  me  a  reporter's  job  if  I  don't  look 
good  to  you.  Put  me  on  to  some  feature  stuff  for 
a  while." 

"All  right.  Sit  in,  and  I  '11  give  you  a  line 
on  a  few  things  I  'd  like  to  have  hunted  down." 

When  he  left  the  office  half  an  hour  later, 
Kenwick  sought  the  public  library.  There  he 
spent  the  entire  afternoon  and  a  part  of  the  eve 
ning.  It  was  about  nine  o'clock  when  he  entered 
the  St.  Germaine,  a  modest  hotel  in  the  uptown 
district.  The  night  clerk  cast  an  inquiring  glance 
in  search  of  his  suit-case. 

"My  baggage  has  n't  come  yet,"  the  prospec 
tive  guest  explained  tranquilly.  "It  may  be  in 
to-morrow.  If  you  want  to  know  anything  about 
me,  call  Allen  Boyer  at  the  'Clarion'  office." 

When  he  had  been  shown  to  his  room  on  the 
fifth  floor  he  lighted  the  lamp  on  the  stand  near 
his  bed  and  became  absorbed  in  the  contents  of 
one  of  the  weekly  magazines.  He  read  until  very 
late  and  then  snapped  out  the  light,  cursing  him 
self  for  having  abused  his  eyes  on  the  eve  of 
taking  a  new  position. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    83 

The  next  morning  he  was  out  early,  eager  to 
hunt  down  one  of  the  stories  that  Boyer  had  sug 
gested.  As  he  swung  out  into  the  exhilaration  of 
the  crisp  November  morning  on  the  scent  of  an 
assignment  some  of  the  old  self-assurance  and 
buoyancy  came  back  to  him. 

Half  an  hour  after  he  had  left  the  hotel,  the 
revolving  doors  swung  round  the  circle  to  admit 
a  man  with  prosperous  leather  suit-case  and 
"freckled"  eyes.  The  day  clerk  handed  him  a 
pen  and  registration-slip.  He  was  beginning  to 
sign,  after  a  curt  question  about  the  rates,  when 
the  blond  cashier,  perched  on  a  stool  in  the  wire 
cage  adjoining  the  desk,  pushed  a  similar  slip  of 
paper  toward  the  clerk.  "Can't  quite  make  out 
that  name,"  she  confessed.  "Looks  like  Renwich. 
Do  you  get  it?' 

The  desk  official  glanced  at  it  with  the  casually 
professional  air  of  one  to  whom  all  the  mysteries 
of  chirography  are  as  an  open  book.  "It 's  Ken- 
wick.  Plain  as  day — Roger  Ken  wick." 

The  pen  slid  from  the  fingers  of  the  man  on 
the  other  side  of  the  desk.  For  a  moment,  self- 
possession  deserted  Richard  Glover.  He  stood 
there  staring  hard  at  the  ugly  blot  which  he 
had  made  across  his  own  signature.  Then  he 


84    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

crumpled  the  bit  of  paper,  threw  it  into  the  waste- 
basket,  and,  suit-case  in  hand,  went  out  into 
the  street. 

The  day  clerk  darted  a  contemptuous  glance 
after  his  disappearing  figure.  'Some  nut,"  he 
remarked.  "Told  me  the  terms  were  all  right 
and  then  got  cold  feet.  I  '11  bet  he  's  a  crook." 

"Sure  he  's  a  crook."  The  blond  cashier  spoke 
with  cheerful  authority.  "I  could  have  told  you 
that  when  he  first  came  in.  I  can  size  'em  up 
as  far  off  as  the  front  door.  And  I  had  him  posted 
on  the  'Losses  by  Default'  page  before  he  'd 
set  down  his  bag." 

The  day  clerk  regarded  her  musingly.  "He 
had  a  bag,  though,  and  that  Js  more  than  this 
Kenwick  fellow  showed.  But  Brown  thought  he 
was  all  right  and  let  him  have  526.  Did  you 
notice  him  this  morning?  Tall,  dark  fellow, 
young  but  with  hair  a  little  gray  around  the 
temples." 

"Ye-a.  High-brow.  Looks  like  he  was  here 
for  his  health.  Probably  broke  down  in  some 
government  job." 

"No,  he  's  a  newspaper  man." 

"Let's  see  where  he's  from?"  She  reached 
for  the  slip. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    85 

"New  York.  Well,  I  slipped  a  cog.  I  would 
have  said  he  was  a  Westerner." 

"That 's  right.  That  last  chap  looked  more 
like  New  York  to  me.  But  you  never  can  tell. 
And  something  seemed  to  hit  him  all  wrong 
about  this  place." 

With  this  conclusion  Richard  Glover  was  in 
complete  accord.  As  he  walked  down  Geary 
Street  clutching  his  heavy  bag,  he  was  conscious 
with  every  nerve  of  his  being  that  something  had 
struck  him  decidedly  wrong  about  the  St.  Ger- 
maine.  "It  might  be  just  a  coincidence,"  he  re 
assured  himself.  "It  Js  undoubtedly  just  a  coinci 
dence  but — but  that  is  n't  such  a  very  common 
name.  My  God!  I  begin  to  feel  like  a  spy 
caught  in  his  own  trap." 

With  scarcely  more  than  a  glance  at  the  name 
above  the  entrance  he  turned  into  the  lobby  of 
another  hotel  and  signed  for  a  room.  It  was  al 
most  noon  when  he  appeared  again  and  wrote 
a  letter  at  one  of  the  lobby  desks.  It  was  not  a 
long  letter,  hardly  more  than  a  note,  but  its  com 
position  consumed  almost  an  hour  and  a  half  a 
dozen  sheets  of  stationery,  which  were  succes 
sively  torn  to  bits  and  thrown  into  the  waste-bas 
ket.  And  then  at  last  the  final  sheet  met  the  same 


86    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

fate  and  Richard  Glover  sat  tapping  the  desk 
softly  with  the  edge  of  the  blotter. 

"No,  I  won't  write;  I  '11  just  go,"  he  decided. 
"For  asking  if  I  may  come  almost  invites  a  re 
fusal.  And  then  it  takes  longer.  I  '11  go  up  there 
this  afternoon.  The  secret  of  getting  what  you 
want  out  of  people  is  to  take  them  off  guard." 

Following  this  policy  he  set  out  in  the  late 
afternoon  to  pay  a  call.  At  the  door  of  the  up 
town  address  he  was  met  by  a  colored  maid.  She 
offered  him  neither  hope  nor  despair  but  agreed  to 
present  his  card. 

And  in  front  of  the  living-room  fire  Marcreta 
Morgan  read  the  card  and  flicked  it  across  to 
her  brother.  "I  don't  think  I  care  to  see  any 
body  to-day,"  she  said.  "It 's  your  first  night  at 
home,  and  there  's  so  much  to  talk  about." 

"Don't  know  him,"  Clinton  decided.  "Some 
body  you  met  while  I  was  away?" 

"Oh,  yes,  you  know  him,  Clint.  You  in 
troduced  me  to  him  yourself.  Don't  you  remem 
ber  he  came  here  one  night  before  you  went  to 
Washington  and  asked  you  to  analyze  some 
specimens  of  mineral  water." 

"Oh,  that  fellow!  Has  he  been  hanging 
around  here  ever  since?" 

"Well,  no.    I  can't  say  that  he  has  hung  around 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    87 

exactly.  But  of  late  he  has  called  rather  often. 
He's  really  quite  entertaining  in  some  ways.  You 
were  very  much  interested  in  his  specimens." 

"In  his  specimens,  yes." 

It  may  have  been  that  she  resented  his  implied 
dislike.  It  may  have  been  for  some  other  reason. 
But  Marcreta  suddenly  reversed  her  decision. 
"Show  him  in,  please,"  she  ordered.  Anc]  the 
next  moment  the  visitor  stood  in  the  doorway. 

It  was  apparent  as  he  crossed  the  long  room 
that  he  had  not  expected  to  meet  any  one  save 
his  hostess.  But  he  responded  warmly  to  Clin 
ton's  handshake  and  drew  up  a  chair  for  himself 
opposite  Marcreta.  "It 's  a  pleasant  surprise  to 
find  you  here,  Mr.  Morgan,"  he  said.  "I  thought 
you  were  still  in  the  service  at  Washington.  But 
it 's  time  for  every  one  to  be  getting  home  now, 
is  n't  it T 

Clinton  Morgan  surveyed  him  silently.  It 
struck  him  that  his  guest  was  very  much  at  home 
himself.  For  a  time  the  conversation  followed 
that  level,  triangular  form  of  talk  which  so  effec 
tually  conceals  purpose  and  personality.  Then 
Clinton  excused  himself  on  the  plea  that  he  had 
some  unpacking  to  do,  and  Marcreta  and  Richard 
Glover  were  left  alone. 

"It 's  been  a  long  time  since  I  've  seen  you, 


88    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Mr.  Glover,"  she  said.  "You  have  n't  been  in 
the  Bay  region  lately?" 

"No,  I  've  not  been  able  to  get  away."  His 
tone  indicated  that  he  had  chafed  under  this 
pressure  of  adverse  circumstance.  "But  it 's  good 
to  get  back  now,"  he  went  on.  "I  'm  always  glad 
to  get  back — here." 

She  ignored  the  new  ardent  note  in  his  voice. 
"But  the  southern  part  of  the  State  is  beautiful," 
she  said.  "Mont-Mer,  particularly,  is  so  beau 
tiful  that  it  makes  the  soul  ache." 

The  words  seemed  to  startle  him.  His  eyes  left 
the  camouflaged  log  of  wood  in  the  fireplace  and 
fixed  themselves  steadily  upon  her.  "How  do 
you  know?  How  do  you,  San  Francisco-bound, 
know?" 

fl  have  just  returned  from  there.  My  brother 
and  I  arrived  home  the  same  day.  I  spent  a 
week  near  Mont-Mer  visiting  my  friends,  the 
Paddingtons.  Do  you  know  them?" 

"No.  But  I  think  I  know  their  home.  They 
call  it  'Utopia,'  I  believe?" 

"Yes.  And  until  I  saw  it  I  had  always  thought 
that  Utopia  was  a  myth." 

"Mont-Mer,"  he  mused,  "does  look  rather  like 
a  fairy-story  come  true,  doesn't  it?  There's 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    89 

something  perilously  seductive  about  it.     It 's  a 
place  where  people  go  to  forget." 

"I  have  heard  that  said  about  it,  but  somehow 
it  did  n't  make  that  kind  of  an  appeal  to  me. 
I  had  the  feeling  that  in  such  a  place  as  that 
every  sorrow  of  life  is  a  bleeding  wound.  There  's 
a  terrible  cruelty  about  that  tropical  sort  of 
beauty.  It  drives  memories  in,  not  out." 

For  some  unaccountable  reason  the  tensity  of 
her  tone  annoyed  him.  "You  didn't  like  it 
then?' 

"It's  beautiful,  as  I  have  said,  but — I  shall 
never  go  there  again." 

"The  place  you  ought  to  see,"  he  told  her,  "is 
Cedargrove,  about  two  hours'  trip  to  the  south." 

"That's  where  the  mineral  springs  are?' 

"Yes.  And  what  I  really  came  to  tell  you 
to-day  is  that  I  've  bought  the  controlling  interest 
in  the  springs.  It  was  after  your  brother  had 
given  me  his  final  analysis  of  the  water  last  year 
that  I  decided  to  do  it.  He  said,  you  know,  that 
in  his  opinion  the  medicinal  ingredients  equaled 
that  of  the  waters  of  Carlsbad.  I  've  made 
great  plans.  You  see,  there  are  twenty  acres, 
and  so  far  we  've  found  eighteen  springs.  We  've 
been  bottling  the  stuff  for  several  months  now 


90    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

and  it 's  selling  like  hot  cakes.  The  next  step 
is  a  hotel.  It's  not  to  be  too  colossal,  but  unique 
in  every  respect.  That's  what  takes  in  Cali 
fornia.  Show  people  that  you  've  got  'something 
different'  and  they  '11  jump  to  the  conclusion  that 
because  it 's  different  it  must  be  desirable.  That 's 
America.  I  've  had  other  chemists  besides  your 
brother  tell  me  that  the  water  is  wonderful. 
The  best  doctors  in  the  South  declare  that  those 
springs  are  a  bigger  find  than  a  gold  mine." 

He  had  warmed  to  his  theme  now  and  his 
amber  eyes  glowed.  And  she  followed  his  words 
with  that  quick  responsiveness  that  was  all  un 
consciously  one  of  her  chief  charms.  "And  what 
are  your  advertising  plans  ?"  she  asked. 

It  was  like  a  fresh  supply  of  gasolene  to  an 
engine.  He  plunged  into  stupendous  plans  for 
a  publicity  campaign.  "I  'm  doing  most  of  the 
copy  work  myself  so  far.  I  love  the  advertising 
game.  I  love  telling  people  what  they  want  and 
making  them  want  it.  I  'm  calling  it  The  Carls 
bad  of  America.'  That  will  get  the  health- 
seekers,  and  health-seekers  will  pay  any  price." 

For  half  an  hour  he  talked,  going  into  every 
detail  of  his  plan.  And  then  all  at  once  he 
stopped  abruptly  as  though  he  had  grown  sud 
denly  weary  of  Carlsbad.  She  sat  gazing  into  the 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    91 

fire,  waiting  in  sympathetic  silence,  for  him  to 
resume  the  subject.  But  he  didn't  resume  it. 
When  he  spoke  again,  his  tone  had  changed  as 
well  as  his  theme.  For  the  first  time  the  conver 
sation  became  keenly  personal.  He  talked  about 
himself  with  a  humility  that  was  quite  new  and, 
to  his  listener,  somewhat  startling. 

"I  don't  think  it  can  be  a  complete  surprise  to 
you,"  he  said,  "to  know  how  much  I  need  you; 
how  much  I  depend  upon  your  sympathy  and  un 
derstanding.  You  must  have  guessed  something 
of  my  feeling.  You  are  too  intuitive  not  to  have 
guessed." 

Her  frank,  blue-gray  eyes  were  fixed  upon  him 
with  an  expression  that  baffled  him,  yet  gave  him 
hope.  "No,  it  is  not  quite  unexpected,"  she  ad 
mitted.  "But  I  did  n't  realize  that  it  had  gone 
quite  so  far.  It  seems  to  have  all  happened  rather 
suddenly.  We  have  n't  known  each  other  very 
long;  not  nearly  long  enough  for  anything  like 
this." 

"No.  But  I  've  been  looking  for  you  all  my 
life.  That  ought  to  count  for  something." 

"For  something — yes.  But  not  for  so  much  as 
—that." 

"Love  is  n't  a  matter  of  time,"  he  told  her. 

"No.    But  it  Js  a  matter  of  exploration.    It  Js 


92    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

a  matter  of  finding  each  other.  And  in  the  half 
a  dozen  times  that  you  have  called  here,  Mr. 
Glover,  we  have  n't  talked  about  the  finding  kind 
of  things.  No,  we  don't  know  each  other.  We 
don't  know  each  other  half  well  enough  to  con 
sider  anything  like  this." 

"But  we  can  get  to  know  each  other  better.  Is 
there  any  reason  why  we  should  not  do  that4?" 

She  pondered  this  for  a  moment.  "Well,  for 
one  thing,  there  is  distance." 

"There  is  no  longer  distance,"  he  pleaded 
eagerly.  "For  I  have  severed  my  connections 
with  Mont-Mer." 

"Oh!"  He  couldn't  tell  whether  the  excla 
mation  emanated  from  pleasure  or  merely  sur 
prise.  "You  severed  your  connections  there  be 
cause  of  this  new  Carlsbad  plan?" 

"Partly  because  of  that.  But  chiefly  because 
a  secretaryship  to  a  rich  man  doesn't  get  one 
anywhere." 

"I  suppose  not." 

Still  he  could  n't  decide  whether  her  interest 
now  was  genuine  or  only  courteous.  But  she  would 
give  him  no  further  encouragement  than  to  allow 
him  to  call  occasionally.  And  with  this  per 
mission  he  went  away  well  content. 

Ten  minutes  after  he  heard  the  front  door  close, 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    93 

Clinton,  in  a  dressing-gown  and  slippers,  ap 
peared  on  the  threshold  of  his  sister's  room. 
"Gone,  at  last?"  he  queried.  "What's  Glover 
doing  up  here  anyway?  I  thought  he  was  se 
curely  anchored  with  a  millionaire  hermit  down 
South." 

She  spoke  without  turning  from  the  dressing- 
table  where  she  was  shaking  her  long  dark  hair 
down  over  an  amethyst-colored  negligee.  "You 
don't  like  him,  do  you?" 

"No,  I  can't  say  that  I  do." 

"Why  not?" 

Before  the  directness  of  the  question  he  felt 
suddenly  shamefaced,  as  a  man  always  does  who 
condemns  one  of  his  own  sex  before  a  woman  on 
insufficient  evidence.  "Oh,  he 's  all  right,  of 
course.  I  have  no  reason  really  for  disliking  the 

fellow,  except Well,  he  seems  to  like  you  too 

much.  And  he  's  not  your  style.  What  did  he 
want  to-night?" 

"He  wanted  to  tell  me  about  a  new  scheme  he 
has,  a  really  wonderful  enterprise,  Clint,  for  turn 
ing  that  mineral  water  place  into  a  health-resort. 
He  's  taken  over  most  of  the  stock  and  he  talked 
glowingly  about  it." 

"He  does  talk  well;  I  Jll  admit  that.  But  who 
is  going  to  capitalize  this  venture?" 


94    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

His  sister  smiled.  "Well,  Clinton,  I  could 
hardly  ask  him  that,  you  know." 

"No,  I  suppose  not.  And  if  you  had,  I  imagine 
that  he  would  hardly  have  liked  to  answer  it. 
Anyhow,  he  's  cheered  you  up,  and  I  ought  to  be 
grateful  to  him  for  that.  It  was  a  mistake  for 
you  to  take  that  trip  to  Mont-Mer,  Crete.  It 
was  too  much  for  you." 

She  made  no  response  to  this,  and  her  brother, 
noting  the  delicately  flushed  face  and  languid 
movements,  told  himself  reproachfully  that  the 
mistake  was  in  going  away  and  leaving  her  to 
struggle  alone  with  the  hospital  venture.  He  sat 
down  on  a  cedar  chest  beside  the  window. 

"Let 's  retint  the  whole  lower  floor,  Crete,"  he 
suggested,  seizing  upon  the  first  change  of  topic 
that  offered  itself.  "Now  that  this  place  is  to  be 
a  home  again  and  not  a  sanitarium,  let 's  retint 
and  get  the  public  institution  smell  out  of  it." 

She  laid  down  the  ivory  brush  and  turned  to 
him.  But  her  gaze  was  abstracted,  and  when  she 
spoke  in  a  musing  voice,  her  words  showed  that 
she  had  not  been  listening.  "Clinton,  have  you 
ever  figured  out  just  how  much  of  the  Coalinga  oil 
stock  belongs  to  me"?" 

He  had  been  sitting  with  one  knee  hugged  be- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    95 

tween  his  arms.  Now  he  released  it  and  brought 
himself  upright  upon  the  cedar  chest. 

"Why,  no,  I  have  n't.  I  don't  think  it  makes 
much  difference,  while  we're  living  together,  shar 
ing  everything  this  way." 

She  got  up  from  the  dressing-table  and  walked 
over  to  the  far  window,  drawing  the  deep  lace 
collar  of  the  the  amethyst  negligee  up  about  her 
ears  as  though  to  screen  herself  from  his  view. 
Out  on  the  bay  the  lighted  ferry-boats  plied  their 
silent  passage,  and  on  the  Key  Route  pier  an 
orange-colored  train  crawled  cautiously,  like  a 
brilliant  caterpillar,  across  a  thread  of  track. 
Marcreta,  gazing  out  into  the  clear  soft  dusk,  sent 
a  question  backward  over  her  shoulder. 

"Would  it  be  very  much  trouble  to  go  over 
our  properties  some  time  and — make  a  division?" 

"No,  it  would  n't  be  much  trouble,  and  I  sup 
pose  it  would  be  much  more  businesslike."  He 
spoke  briskly  but  she  knew  that  her  demand  had 
astonished  him.  "You  know,"  he  admitted  rue 
fully,  "I  don't  pretend  to  be  much  of  a  business 
man.  I  think  you  may  be  right  to  insist  upon  an 
accounting." 

"O  Clint!  I  don't  mean  that.  You  know  I 
don't  mean  that."  Her  voice  held  the  stricken 


96    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

tone  of  the  sensitive  nature  stabbed  by  the  swift 
realization  that  it  has  hurt  some  one  else. 
"You  've  been  the  best  brother  a  girl  ever  had. 
You  've  been  too  good  to  me.  I  did  n't  mean 
that  at  all." 

"What  do  you  mean  then,  Crete*?" 
Her  answer  seemed  to  grope  its  way  through  an 
underbrush  of  tangled  emotions.  "I  just  thought 
it  would  be  well  for  us  each  to  know  what  we 
have  because — you  see,  we  may  not  always  be 
living  together  like  this." 


CHAPTER  IX 

A  MONTH  had  passed  since  Kenwick  became 
a  member  of  the  staff  of  the  "San  Francisco 
Clarion."  The  work  had  been  going  well,  and 
the  perpetual  small  excitement  of  a  newspaper 
office  brought  back  some  of  the  old  thrill  that  he 
had  known  in  his  college  days.  But  every  emo 
tion  came  in  subdued  form  now.  There  was  a 
shadow  across  his  sky,  a  soft  pedal  applied  to 
every  emotion.  And  until  this  was  lifted  he  re 
solved  to  deny  himself  a  sight  of  the  house  on 
Pine  Street. 

But  during  the  beginning  of  his  fifth  week  in 
the  city  desire  overcame  pride  and  caution,  and 
late  one  night  he  walked  up  the  familiar  hill 
and  looked  into  one  of  the  lighted  windows. 
There  was  no  one  in  the  room  and  the  furniture 
and  floors  were  covered  with  heavy  canvas  sheet 
ing  spattered  with  calcimine.  An  ugly  step-lad 
der  stood  directly  in  front  of  the  window,  partly 
obstructing  his  view.  He  was  about  to  turn  away 
in  bleak  despair  when  the  glitter  of  some  small 
object  in  a  far  corner  of  the  room  caught  his  eye. 

97 


98    THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Peering  more  intently  under  the  half-drawn 
shade  he  saw  that  the  gleaming  thing  was  a  small 
tinsel  ball  suspended  from  the  lowest  branch  of 
a  tiny  Christmas-tree.  It  was  almost  New  Year's 
day  now,  and  the  little  fir  with  its  brave  showing 
of  gilt  and  silver  had  been  relegated  to  a  distant 
corner  to  make  way  for  the  aggressive  progress  of 
the  painters.  The  man  at  the  window,  staring 
in  from  the  darkness  at  the  drooping  glory  of 
the  little  tree,  felt  for  it  a  sudden  sense  of 
kinship.  And  the  Christmas-tree  stared  back  at 
him  with  an  inarticulate  sort  of  questioning. 
There  was  to  Kenwick  a  terrible  sort  of  patience 
in  its  attitude.  Torn  away  from  its  normal  en 
vironment,  transplanted  suddenly  and  without 
warning  into  surroundings  giddily  artificial,  and 
bereft  of  the  roots  with  which  to  explore  them, 
the  little  fir-tree  stood  there,  holding  in  its  out 
stretched  arms  the  baubles  of  an  unfamiliar  and 
irrelevant  existence.  He  turned  away,  maddened 
by  a  fury  that  he  did  not  comprehend.  "Any 
thing  but  that!"  he  cried  savagely.  "Anything 
but  the  patience  of  hopelessness!" 

His  thoughts  were  in  a  whirl,  and  he  was  un 
conscious  of  the  fact  that  he  was  almost  running 
down  the  slanting  pavement.  When  he  became 
aware  of  it  he  slackened  his  pace  abruptly. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY    99 

He  was  a  fool,  he  told  himself.  "Anybody  watch 
ing  me  would  size  me  up  for  an  escaped  convict — 
prowling  around  doorsteps  at  night;  sneaking  up 
to  windows,  like  a  professional  burglar  looking 
over  his  territory." 

He  let  himself  into  his  room  at  the  St.  Ger- 
maine  and  snapped  on  the  light.  The  first  thing 
his  eyes  fell  upon  in  the  bare,  prim  chamber  was 
a  letter  propped  against  his  mirror.  It  was  a 
yellow  envelope  and  it  bore  the  dull  black  in 
signia  of  the  dead-letter  office.  There  was  some 
thing  ominous-looking  about  it.  There  is  always 
something  ominous  about  that  pale  yellow,  un 
stamped  envelope  that  issues,  unheralded  and  un 
wanted,  from  the  cemetery  of  letters.  Inside  of  it 
was  a  communication  written  upon  the  St.  Ger- 
maine  stationery  and  addressed  in  his  own  hand 
writing  to  his  brother,  Everett  Kenwick.  It  had 
been  opened  and  sealed  again,  and  across  one  end 
something  was  written.  The  single  word  seemed 
to  leap  out  at  Kenwick  with  the  brutal  unex 
pectedness  of  a  bomb.  He  dropped  the  envelope 
as  though  it  had  stung  him  and  stood  gazing  down 
at  it.  It  stared  malignantly  back  at  him,  burning 
a  fiery  path  to  his  brain.  Up  and  down  the  room 
he  strode  muttering  over  and  over  to  himself 
that  one  horrible  word:  "Deceased!  Deceased!" 


loo  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

The  walls  of  the  room  seemed  to  be  coming 
closer  and  closer.  He  felt  as  if  he  were  being 
smothered.  Taking  his  hat  he  went  out  into 
the  hall,  and  walked  down  the  five  flights  of  stairs 
rather  than  encounter  the  elevator-boy.  On  the 
way  down  he  decided  to  send  a  telegram  of 
inquiry  to  the  family  lawyer  in  New  York.  The 
indelible  pencil  handed  to  him  by  the  girl  in  the 
little  hotel  booth  seemed  to  write  the  message 
quite  of  its  own  accord.  And  there  was  a  calming 
sort  of  comfort  in  the  impersonal  manner  of  the 
telegraph-operator  herself  as  she  counted  off  me 
chanically  the  frantic  words  of  his  query. 

As  he  turned  away  he  was  conscious  of  only  one 
impulse;  to  be  with  somebody.  He  must  have 
companionship  of  some  sort,  any  sort,  or  he  would 
lose  his  reason.  From  the  dining-room  there 
drifted  out  to  him  the  pleasant  din  of  human 
voices.  He  made  his  way  inside  and  followed  the 
head-waiter  to  his  accustomed  seat  beside  one  of 
the  mirror  walls. 

The  hotel  dining-room  was  full  that  evening. 
There  was  an  Elks'  convention  in  the  city  and 
the  lobby  swarmed  with  delegates.  At  his  table 
Kenwick  found  three  other  men,  and  was  pa 
thetically  grateful  for  their  comradeship.  Two 
of  them  were  from  Sacramento.  The  third  intro- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  tea 

duced  himself  as  Granville  Jarvis,  late  of  New 
Orleans.  Kenwick  remembered  having  seen  him 
several  times  about  the  hotel.  He  had  that  quiet, 
magnetic  sort  of  personality  that  never  comes 
quite  halfway  to  meet  the  casual  acquaintance, 
but  that  possesses  a  subtle,  indefinable  power  that 
lures  others  across  the  intervening  territory.  "I 
have  something  for  you,"  Granville  Jarvis  seemed 
to  say.  "I  have  something  that  I  '11  be  glad  to 
give  you — if  you  care  to  come  and  get  it." 

The  other  men  talked  volubly,  including  the 
quartet  in  their  random  conversation.  Jarvis  was 
an  appreciative  listener,  an  unmistakable  como- 
polite,  whose  occasional  contributions  to  the  table- 
talk  were  keen-edged  and  subtly  humorous.  In 
his  speech  lingered  only  a  faint  trace  of  the 
Southern  drawl.  Of  the  three  men,  his  was  the 
personality  which  attracted  Kenwick.  The  two 
Elks  finished  their  dessert  hurriedly  and  left  be 
fore  the  coffee  was  served.  Then  Granville 
Jarvis,  glancing  at  the  haggard  face  of  the  young 
man  across  the  table,  ventured  the  first  personal 
remark  of  the  hour.  "You  've  scarcely  eaten  a 
thing,  and  you  look  all  in.  I  don't  want  to  intrude 
into  your  affairs,  but  is  there  anything  I  can  do?" 

It  was  that  unexpected  kindliness  that  always 
proves  too  much  for  overstrung  nerves.  "I  Jve 


102  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

just  had  bad  news,"  Ken  wick  admitted.  "It  Js 
rather  shaken  me  up.  But  you  can't  do  anything, 
thanks." 

"Better  take  a  walk  out  in  the  fresh  air,"  Jarvis 
suggested.  "I  know  how  you  feel.  It 's  beastly 
— when  a  man  is  all  alone." 

"I  am  alone;  that's  the  damnable  part  of  it. 
And  I  've  got  to  somehow  get  through  the  night." 

The  other  man  nodded  with  silent  comprehen 
sion.  "I  '11  take  a  stroll  with  you  if  you  like, 
and  you  don't  have  to  talk." 

Kenwick  accepted  the  offer  eagerly,  and  for 
an  hour  he  and  his  companion  walked  almost  in 
silence.  Then  Kenwick,  still  haunted  by  the  spec 
ter  of  solitude,  invited  the  New  Orleans  man  up 
to  his  room.  There  stretched  out  comfortably  in 
two  deep  chairs,  with  an  ash-tray  between  them, 
they  discussed  politics,  books,  and  New  York. 
"It 's  my  home  town,"  Kenwick  explained,  "but 
I  'm  a  Westerner  by  adoption.  They  say,  'Once 
a  New  Yorker,  always  a  New  Yorker/  but  it 
has  n't  worked  that  way  with  me." 

Jarvis  smiled.  "They  say  that  about  Emporia, 
Kansas,  too,  and  about  all  the  other  towns  ranging 
in  between.  It 's  a  world-wide  colloquialism. 
Don't  you  go  back  to  visit,  though?" 

"I  Ve  been  thinking  of  it,"  his  host  replied. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  103 

And  then,  despite  the  fact  that  his  guest  was  a 
complete  stranger,  perhaps  because  of  that  fact, 
he  felt  an  overwhelming  desire  to  tell  him  of  his 
trouble.  For  there  is  a  certain  security  in  con 
fiding  a  sorrow  to  a  casual  stranger.  Every  care- 
ridden  person  in  the  world  has  felt  the  impulse, 
has  been  impelled  to  it  by  the  realization  that 
there  is  safety  in  remoteness.  You  will  never  see 
the  stranger  again,  or  if  you  do,  he  will  have  for 
gotten  you  and  your  trouble.  A  transitory  inter 
est  has  its  advantages.  It  demands  nothing  in 
the  way  of  a  sequel.  It  keeps  no  watch  upon  your 
struggle ;  it  demands  no  final  reckoning.  You  and 
your  agony  are  to  the  chance  acquaintance  a 
short-story,  not  a  serial. 

Jarvis  was  leaning  back  in  his  deep  chair,  one 
leg  dangling  carelessly  over  the  broad  arm.  His 
eye-glasses,  rimmed  with  the  thinnest  thread  of 
tortoise-shell,  gave  him  a  certain  intellectuality. 
Although  he  was  still  in  the  early  thirties  there 
were  deep  lines  about  his  mouth.  He  had  lived, 
Kenwick  decided.  And  having  lived,  he  must 
know  something  about  life.  Jarvis  glanced  up 
suddenly  and  met  his  gaze. 

"Funny  thing,  my  being  here,  isn't  it?"  he 
said.  "Up  here  in  your  room,  smoking  your 
cigars,  sprawling  over  your  furniture  as  though 


104  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

I  'd  known  you  always  instead  of  being  the  merest 
chance  acquaintance." 

Mashing  the  gray  end  of  his  cigar  into  the  ash 
tray  Ken  wick  made  slow- toned  response.  "I 
don't  think  it 's  curious.  I  don't  think  it 's  curious 
at  all  because  as  I  look  back  on  my  life  all  the 
vital  things  in  it  have  had  casual  beginnings.  I 
have  a  steadily  increasing  respect  for  the  small 
emergencies  of  life.  Whenever  I  carefully  set 
my  stage  for  some  dramatic  event  it 's  sure  to  turn 
out  a  thin  affair.  The  best  scenes  are  those  which 
are  impromptu  and  carry  their  own  properties." 

"That's  flattering  to  a  chance  acquaintance, 
but  a  hard  knock  at  your  friends." 

"I  'm  all  for  chance  acquaintances,"  Ken  wick 
responded.  "Friends  have  an  uncomfortable  habit 
of  failing  to  show  up  at  the  moment  of  crisis. 
Just  when  you  're  terribly  in  need  of  them,  they 
fall  sick  or  get  absorbed  in  building  a  new  house, 
or  go  to  Argentina.  And  then,  before  you  have 
time  to  grow  cynical,  along  comes  somebody  that 
you  just  bow  to  on  the  street,  and  he  sees  you  are 
in  trouble  and  offers  a  lift.  The  people  who 
really  owe  you  something,  never  pay.  They  pass 
the  buck  to  the  chance  acquaintance,  and  nine 
times  out  of  ten  he  makes  good.  Makes  things 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  105 

more  interesting  that  way.  After  all,  life  is  n't 
merely  a  system  of  bookkeeping." 

Kenwick  prided  himself  upon  the  fact  that  he 
had  kept  the  bitterness  out  of  his  voice,  but  when 
Jarvis  spoke,  this  illusion  was  shattered.  "Tough 
luck,  Mr.  Kenwick.  As  I  said  before,  I  don't 
want  to  horn  in,  but  I  'd  be  glad  to  score  another 
point  for  the  C.  A.  if  it  would  be  of  any  help 
to  you,  and  there  's  nobody  else  about." 

Kenwick  put  down  his  cigar.  "To  tell  the 
truth,  there  's  nobody  about  at  all.  It  happens 
that  during  the  past  year  every  friend  I  had  has 
gone,  figuratively  speaking,  to  Argentina.  Some 
of  them  used  to  be  particularly  good  at  helping 
me  out  with  my  yarns.  I  'm  a  fiction-writer,  you 
know,  and  I  'm  under  contract  to  finish  a  mystery- 
story  for  one  of  the  magazines.  I  'm  stuck,  and 
it 's  bothering  me  a  lot.  Can't  move  the  thing  a 
peg.  I  know  that  the  man  who  talks  about  his 
own  stories  is  as  much  of  a  pest  as  the  man  who 
tells  his  dreams  but  if " 

Jarvis  had  settled  down  into  his  chair  with  a 
sigh  of  luxurious  content.  "Shoot,"  he  com 
manded.  "It 's  great  stuff  being  talked  to  when 
I  'm  not  expected  to  make  any  replies.  What 's 
the  name  of  it?' 


io6THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"It  has  n't  any  name  just  yet,  but  I  '11  let  you 
be  godfather  at  the  christening.  This  is  just  a 
scenario  of  the  situation,  with  all  the  color  and 
atmosphere  left  but."  He  reached  over  and 
snapped  off  the  chandelier  light,  leaving  only  the 
soft  glow  from  the  little  brass  lamp  upon  the 
table. 

"The  story,"  he  began  when  he  had  resumed  his 
seat,  "hinges  upon  the  fortunes  of  two  brothers — 
or  rather  the  fortunes  of  one  and  the  misfortunes 
of  the  other.  The  parents  die  when  the  elder  of 
the  two  is  thirty  and  the  younger  almost  nineteen. 
The  older  brother  has  married,  and  at  the  death 
of  his  mother  comes  back  with  his  wife,  to  live 
at  the  old  home.  But  the  sister-in-law  and 
younger  brother  are  not  congenial,  and  the  boy, 
who  has  ambitions  for  a  professional  training  de 
cides  to  go  away  from  home  to  a  distant  uni 
versity.  There  is  very  little  opposition  to  the 
plan.  For  the  sister-in-law  is  in  favor  of  it,  and 
the  elder  brother  (who  is  guardian,  of  course,  and 
a  splendid  fellow)  consents  on  the  condition  that 
the  boy  spend  his  summer  vacations  at  home.  He 
hopes  in  this  way  to  keep  in  touch  with  him  and 
does. 

"In  the  spring  of  his  senior  year,  America  enters 
the  war,  and  the  boy,  now  a  man  of  twenty-three, 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  107 

enlists  and  in  the  autumn  gets  across.  He  sees 
more  than  six  months  of  action  at  the  front  with 
out  getting  a  scratch.  But  at  the  end  of  that  time 
his  nerves  go  to  pieces  and  he  is  sent  first  to  a 
convalescent  hospital  in  England  and  then  home. 
There  he  finds  the  old  place  completely  changed 
under  his  sister-in-law's  regime  and  he  is  so  ob 
viously  unhappy  about  it  that  his  brother  sug 
gests  that  he  accept  the  invitation  of  an  old  family 
friend  and  spend  the  winter  with  him  in  his  Cali 
fornia  home.  He  complies  with  this  plan,  the 
more  eagerly  because  it  gives  him  an  excuse  to 
get  back  to  the  environment  which  he  has  grown 
to  love  and  the  associates  that  he  knew  in  his  col 
lege  days. 

"Without  adventure  he  arrives  at  the  little 
southern  California  town,  and  is  met  at  the  depot 
by  his  friend's  chauffeur.  But  on  the  way  out  to 
the  house  they  meet  with  an  automobile  accident 
that  shakes  him  up  pretty  badly  and,  so  far  as  he 
can  determine  from  circumstantial  evidence,  kills 
the  driver.  Stranded  alone  and  injured  in  an 
unfamiliar  village,  he  applies  at  the  first  house  he 
comes  to  for  aid.  It  chances  to  be  one  of  those 
palatial  country  homes,  so  plentiful  in  that  region, 
which  seems  to  have  been  built  for  the  exclusive 
use  of  caretakers.  For  although  it  is  completely 


io8  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

and  elegantly  furnished  and  bears  every  evidence 
of  being  tenanted  he  stays  there  ill  for  more  than 
twenty-four  hours,  absolutely  alone  except  for  the 
presence  of  a  mysterious  woman  who  is  apparently 
locked  into  one  of  the  bedrooms  upstairs,  and 
whom  he  never  sees. 

"On  the  second  night  he  makes  a  surreptitious 
escape  from  this  uncanny  prison,  without  ever 
having  encountered  its  owner,  and  by  a  happy 
stroke  of  chance,  makes  his  way  up  the  coast  to 
San  Francisco.  Here  he  plans  to  establish  him 
self  permanently,  look  up  some  of  his  old  asso 
ciates,  and  get  in  touch  with  life  again.  But  this 
scheme  is  thwarted  in  a  most  unexpected  manner. 
For  on  the  morning  of  his  arrival  something  hap 
pens  that  makes  chaos  of  his  plans  and  starts  him 
upon  a  quest,  not  into  the  future,  but  into  the 
past.  In  the  station  depot  he  stops  long  enough 
to  purchase  a  newspaper,  and " 

Kenwick  paused  for  an  instant  and  glanced  at 
his  auditor. 

"Go  on,"  Jarvis  commanded  with  that  impa 
tient  curtness  that  is  the  best  assurance  of  interest. 

"He  buys  a  newspaper,"  the  narrator  went  on. 
"And  from  the  date  on  it  he  learns  that  instead 
of  having  lost  connection  with  the  world  for  two 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  109 

days,  he  has  been  out  of  it  for  almost  a  year. 
There  are  ten  months  of  his  life  that  he  can't 
account  for  at  all. 

"At  the  library  he  reads  up  and  discovers  that 
the  war  is  over.  From  the  newspapers  and  maga 
zines  he  picks  up  the  thread  of  world  events  and 
orients  himself  with  regard  to  national  and  local 
affairs.  But  to  connect  his  own  past  and  present 
proves,  as  you  may  suspect,  an  almost  hopeless 
task.  He  sends  several  telegrams  to  his  own 
home,  all  of  which  are  ignored.  A  letter  to  his 
brother  brings,  after  long  delay,  the  startling  in 
formation  that  he  is  dead.  The  message  bowls 
him  over  completely.  And  the  more  the  thing 
preys  upon  his  mind  the  more  certain  he  is  that 
there  has  been  foul  play.  He  begins  to  be 
haunted  by  the  conviction  that  he  is  being 
watched.  The  only  safe  course  open  to  him  seems 
to  be  to  lead  as  normal  and  inconspicuous  an 
existence  as  possible  until  he  can  hear  from  the 
family  lawyer." 

Kenwick  broke  off  suddenly  and  reached  for 
the  ash-tray.  "Well,"  he  said,  "what  do  you 
think  of  it?" 

Jarvis  stirred  in  his  chair.  When  he  spoke  he 
appeared  to  be  returning  rather  breathlessly  from 


no  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

a  long  distance.  "Great  stuff,"  he  commented. 
"It  seems  to  have  all  the  ingredients  for  a  best 
seller,  except  one." 

"What's  that?" 

"Well,  I  don't  pose  as  a  critic  of  literature. 
But  judging  from  the  novels  I  've  read  I  should 
say  that  the  thing  it  lacks  is  romance.  The  poor 
devil  ought  to  be  in  love  with  somebody,  or  some 
body  ought  to  be  in  love  with  him." 

Kenwick's  face  stiffened.  It  was  apparent  that 
he  had  not  expected  this  criticism.  And  he  found 
himself  envying  those  people  who  can  discuss 
their  love  affairs.  But  not  to  his  best  friend  could 
he  have  mentioned  Marcreta  Morgan's  name.  "I 
told  you  I  was  just  giving  you  a  scenario  of  this 
thing,"  he  reminded  his  critic.  "I  '11  work  up 
that  part  of  it  later.  As  a  matter  of  fact  there 
is  a  woman  in  it.  He  proposed  to  her  before  he 
went  into  the  service  and  she  rejected  him." 

"And  he  did  n't  look  her  up  afterward?" 

"Well,  he  could  hardly  do  that,  not  until  he 
had  accounted  for  himself.  And  especially  as  she 
had  shown  no  interest  in  him  whatever  while  he 

\ 

was  away." 

"You  never  can  tell  about  a  woman,  though. 
The  fact  that  he  had  come  back  a  pariah  and  was 
in  trouble  might  arouse  her  love." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  111 

"No,  not  her  love;  her  pity  perhaps." 

"Well,  I  won't  argue  with  an  author.  They 
are  supposed  to  be  authorities  on  such  questions. 
Go  on  with  the  thing.  Where  had  the  chap  been 
during  those  ten  months'?" 

"I  have  n't  the  least  idea." 

Jarvis  brought  himself  upright.  "Why,  you 
outrageous  devil!"  he  cried.  "Getting  me  all 
worked  up  over  a  story  that  you  can't  see  the  end 
of  yourself!  And  how  about  the  family  estate^ 
What  became  of  that?' 

"I  haven't  finished  plotting  the  thing  yet. 
That  Js  why  I  told  it  to  you.  If  I  had  solved  all 
its  problems  it  would  n't  have  been  necessary  to 
inflict  it  upon  you." 

His  guest  rose  and  stretched  himself.  "Well, 
I  'm  afraid  I  was  n't  much  help,"  he  said  rue 
fully.  "Fact  is,  I  have  n't  any  creative  imagina 
tion  at  all.  I  'm  the  kind  of  reader  that  writers 
of  detective  yarns  love.  I  '11  swallow  anything 
that 's  got  a  little  salt  on  it,  and  I  never  guess 
right  about  the  ending." 

He  fumbled  in  an  inside  pocket  of  his  coat  and 
drew  out  a  card.  "I  'd  like  to  have  you  return 
this  call  some  time,  Mr.  Kenwick.  I  'm  not  far 
away  from  you,  just  two  blocks  around  the  corner 
in  the  Hartshire  Building.  If  you  care  anything 


112  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

for  photography,  drop  around  some  time  and  I  '11 
show  you  some  interesting  pictures.  They  are  a 
harmless  hobby  of  mine.  I  fuss  around  in  a 
laboratory  over  there  most  of  the  time,  and  when 
I  'm  not  there  I  'm  in  the  dark  room." 

Kenwick  promised  to  come,  and  a  moment  later 
Granville  Jarvis  was  gone.  Bereft  of  his  sym 
pathetic  presence  the  room  seemed  overpowering 
in  its  gaunt  emptiness.  The  last  two  hours  of 
genial  companionship  were  swept  aside  as  ruth 
lessly  as  though  they  had  never  been,  and  Ken- 
wick  found  himself  back  again  at  that  ghastly 
moment  when  he  had  torn  open  the  yellow  en 
velope.  For  he  was  to  learn,  in  the  crucial  school 
of  experience,  that  the  sorrow  of  bereavement  is 
not  a  permanently  engulfing  flood,  but  that  it 
comes  in  waves,  ebbing  away  under  the  pressure 
of  objective  living  only  to  gather  volume  for  a 
renewed  attack.  And  in  the  moment  that  its 
victim  recovers  a  staggering  strength,  it  is  upon 
him  again,  sweeping  aside  in  one  crashing  mo 
ment  the  pitiful  defenses  of  philosophy  and  faith 
which  the  soul  has  constructed  to  save  itself  from 
shipwreck. 

Until  after  midnight  Kenwick  sat  at  the  win 
dow  waiting  for  a  summons  from  the  telephone. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  113 

Then  he  went  to  bed  and  fell  into  a  listening  sort 
of  sleep.  But  not  during  that  night  nor  in  the 
days  that  followed  was  there  any  response  to  his 
telegram. 


CHAPTER  X 

IT  was  on  the  morning  after  his  conversation 
with  Jarvis  that  Boyer,  of  the  "Clarion," 
summoned  Kenwick  into  his  office.  "Got  a  story 
here  that  I  'd  like  to  have  you  hunt  down,"  he 
said,  and  pushed  a  clipping  across  the  table. 
Kenwick  read  it  with  an  interest  that  was  pain 
fully  forced.  It  was  cut  from  one  of  the  local 
evening  papers  and  was  a  rather  colorless  account 
of  the  spectacular  achievements  of  one  of  the 
city's  trance  mediums.  He  noted  down  the  ad 
dress  and  rose  with  a  hint  of  weariness. 

"The  thing  that  makes  her  different  from  the 
others  and  worth  a  trip  out  there,"  his  employer 
explained,  "is  that  Professor  Drew  of  the  psychol 
ogy  department  over  at  the  university  has  set 
himself  the  task  of  showing  her  up.  She  has  done 
some  rather  dramatic  things  that  have  got  on  his 
nerves  and  the  other  day  he  gave  a  lecture  on  her 
methods  before  his  abnormal  psychology  class 
and  had  the  place  packed.  She  has  just  written 
a  book  too ;  bizarre  sort  of  thing  called  the  'Rent 
Veil'  or  the  Torn  Scarf  or  something  like  that. 

114 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  115 

It  ran  in  the  'Record'  about  two  months  ago  and 
they  made  a  big  hit  with  it." 

He  leaned  back  in  his  chair  and  surveyed  Ken- 
wick  speculatively.  "What  do  you  make  of  it?" 
he  asked.  "This  stupendous  revival  of  interest 
in  the  supernatural?  Some  of  our  greatest  writ 
ers  devoting  themselves  to  spirit-writing;  some 
of  our  best  citizens  declaring  that  they  get  com 
fort  and  inspiration  out  of  the  ouija-board  and 
planchette?" 

"I  think,"  Kenwick  answered  slowly,  "that  it 
is  one  of  the  inevitable  results  of  the  war.  It  has 
caused  a  big  upheaval  in  the  spiritual  as  well  as 
the  economic  world.  And  one  of  the  things  that 
it  has  brought  to  the  surface  is  death.  Of  course 
death  has  always  been  with  us  but  unless  it  came 
right  into  our  own  lives  we  have  persistently 
ignored  it,  as  we  have  ignored  the  industrial  prob 
lems  and  immigration  and  a  lot  of  other  things. 
But  during  the  last  few  years  death  has  been 
rampant.  Everybody  has  had  to  look  at  it  from 
a  greater  or  less  distance.  For  awhile  we  '11  .have 
to  go  on  looking  at  it.  And  human  nature  is  so 
constituted  that  it  has  only  two  alternatives.  It 
must  either  ignore  things  or  try  to  account  for 
them.  I  don't  think  this  renaissance  of  the 
supernatural  is  anything  unusual.  Every  great 


n6THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

war  must  have  been  followed  by  a  frenzied  season 
of  accounting  for  death." 

The  other  man  glanced  at  him  with  eyes  in 
which  there  was  no  longer  impersonal  speculation. 
"You  've  been  touched  by  it  too,  Kenwick*?"  he 
ventured. 

"Yes.     My  brother." 

"I  'm  sorry."  He  stretched  out  a  hand. 
"Well,  to  get  back  to  this  Madame  Rosalie;  get 
an  interview  with  her  and  also  with  Drew. 
We  '11  give  'em  each  a  column  on  Sunday.  We 
might  be  able  to  start  a  controversy  that  would 
be  worth  while." 

And  so,  half  an  hour  later,  Kenwick  was  ring 
ing  the  door-bell  at  a  shabby  old  house  on  Fill- 
more  Street.  As  he  stood  there  waiting  he  was 
convinced  that  his  only  motive  for  the  errand  was 
a  journalistic  interest.  But  if  there  is  any  season 
of  life  when  the  sane  well-balanced  man  or 
woman  may  be  tempted  into  the  region  of  the 
occult  it  is  during  that  interval  between  the  shock 
of  bereavement  and  readjustment  to  an  altered 
order  of  existence  when  the  soul  quivers  upon 
the  brink  of  two  worlds.  The  lapse  of  time  be 
tween  shock  and  readjustment  varies  with  every 
temperament,  but  in  that  period  of  helpless  grop- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  117 

ing  we  all  stand  close  to  the  psychic,  the  unex- 
plainable,  the  supernatural. 

If  Kenwick  had  expected  to  find  Madame 
Rosalie's  domain  extraordinary  in  any  particu 
lar,  he  was  distinctly  disappointed.  It  was  one 
of  those  ugly  old  frame  houses  with  protruding 
bay-windows  which  still  weather  competition 
with  the  concrete  and  stucco  residences  in  every 
part  of  the  city.  In  the  front  basement  window 
was  the  hideous  sign  of  a  dry-cleaning  establish 
ment,  and  in  the  neighboring  flat  the  windows 
were  placarded  with  the  promise  to  supply  "Cos 
tumes  for  All  Occasions." 

In  response  to  his  summons  a  petite  dark 
woman  in  a  loose-flowing  garnet  robe  opened  the 
door  and  voiced  the  professional  query,  "You 
have  an  appointment*?" 

When  the  visitor  had  admitted  that  his  call 
was  impromptu,  she  considered  for  a  moment. 
"I  have  a  client  just  now,"  she  explained,  "and 
you  may  not  want  to  wait  until  his  sitting  is 


over." 


"I  '11  wait,"  Kenwick  assured  her.  "How  long 
does  it  take  9"  It  was  instantly  apparent  from 
Madame  Rosalie's  expression  that  this  query  was 
a  violation  of  professional  etiquette.  As  well  in- 


ii8  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

quire  of  a  doctor  how  long  it  will  take  to  perform 
a  major  operation. 

Ignoring  his  query  the  medium  opened  the  door 
wider  and  ushered  her  caller  into  the  front  room. 
It  was  a  dim  commonplace  apartment  furnished 
with  flowered  cretonne-covered  chairs,  a  defiant- 
looking  piano,  and  gilt-framed  pictures.  "You 
will  find  some  magazines  here,"  she  promised. 
"Just  make  yourself  at  home,  please." 

It  would  be  a  difficult  achievement,  the  re 
porter  decided,  as  he  settled  himself  in  one  of 
the  rigid-looking  chairs.  And  Madame  Rosalie's 
tone,  though  courteous,  had  not  been  eager  or 
placating.  It  was  apparent  that  she  had  plenty 
of  business.  Her  manner  of  greeting  had  been 
more  like  that  of  an  experienced  and  self- 
possessed  hostess  taken  unawares  by  a  guest,  than 
of  an  exponent  of  the  supernatural.  She  was 
obviously  an  educated  woman.  Her  voice  alone 
betrayed  that  fact,  and  she  moved  with  a  grace 
that  seemed  somehow  incongruous  in  those  sor 
did  surroundings.  As  he  sat  beside  the  bow- 
windows,  gazing  out  into  the  fog,  Kenwick 
smiled  grimly.  "I  don't  know  Drew  yet,"  he 
murmured,  "but  whoever  he  is,  I'll  bet  she  can 
give  him  a  run  for  his  money." 

Within  twenty  minutes  he  heard  low  voices  at 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  119 

the  far  end  of  the  hall,  and  then  the  sound  of 
approaching  footsteps.  He  rose  and  went  to  the 
door.  Madame  Rosalie  and  her  client  were 
emerging  from  a  shadowy  chamber  whose  door 
was  draped  with  maroon-colored  portieres.  The 
caller  had  reached  the  hat-rack  and  was  jerking 
himself  into  his  overcoat  when  all  at  once  he 
stopped  with  words  of  astonished  greeting. 
"Why,  hello,  Kenwick!"  He  strode  forward 
with  extended  hand.  And  Kenwick  gripped  it 
with  an  equal  astonishment.  It  was  one  of  the 
men  whom  he  had  known  well  at  college.  "Going 
it  strong  now  that  you  are  back  in  civilization 
again?"  On  his  face  was  genuine  pleasure  and 
the  shamefaced  expression  that  it  would  have 
worn  if  the  newspaper  reporter  had  suddenly  en 
countered  him  tobogganing  down  one  of  San 
Francisco's  hills  on  a  child's  coaster. 

When  he  was  gone  the  reporter  followed  his 
hostess  into  the  room  with  the  maroon-colored 
curtains.  It  was  as  shabby  as  the  waiting-room 
but  more  comfortable  and  somehow  expressive  of 
a  strong  personality.  Over  a  felt-covered  table, 
strewn  with  cards  and  stubs  of  pencils  and  other 
aids  to  occult  communication,  was  an  electric 
bulb  held  in  place  by  a  loop  of  white  cotton 
string.  Madame  Rosalie  motioned  him  to  a  seat 


120  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

beside  this  table  and  sank  into  a  deep  chair  on 
the  opposite  side. 

For  a  moment  neither  of  them  spoke.  Madame 
Rosalie's  eyes  rested  upon  her  client  with  a 
scrutiny  that  was  not  inquisitive  but  almost  un 
comfortably  searching.  They  were  dark  eyes  and 
brilliant  with  the  unnatural  shining  that  is  often 
caused  by  chronic  insomnia.  At  first  glance  he 
had  thought  that  her  hair  was  confined  under  a 
net;  now  at  close  range  he  saw  that  it  was  cut 
short  and  waved  alluringly  over  the  lobes  of  her 
ears.  She  had  been  a  beautiful  woman  once,  he 
reflected,  but  life  had  given  her  brutal  treatment. 

He  picked  up  a  crystal  sphere  that  was  lying 
upon  the  table.  "Tell  me  what  you  see  for  me 
in  that*?"  he  commanded. 

She  turned  it  slowly  under  the  light.  Kenwick 
watching  her,  felt  a  little  cheated  by  the  un 
spectacular  quality  of  her  technic.  For  all  the 
thrill  which  she  seemed  likely  to  give  him,  he 
might  as  well  be  opening  an  interview  with  the 
census-taker. 

"You  came,"  the  medium  said  at  last,  still 
gazing  into  the  depths  of  the  crystal,  "to  consult 
me,  not  about  the  future  but  the  past." 

He  made  no  response. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  121 

"You  are  in  trouble,"  she  went  on  in  the  same 
unhurried  voice.  "You  are  in  great  trouble — but 
you  are  not  taking  the  right  way  out." 

"What  is  the  right  way  out?" 

"You  must  have  help." 

An  expression  of  annoyance  crossed  his  face. 
She  would  follow  up  that  statement,  of  course, 
with  the  suggestion  that  he  enlist  for  a  prolonged 
course  of  "readings."  He  was  preparing  a  curt 
dismissal  of  this  plan  when  suddenly  she  set  the 
crystal  down  upon  the  table  and  looked  at  him 
with  compassionate  eyes.  "You  must  have  help," 
she  repeated.  "But  it  must  be  the  help  of  some 
one  who  is  dear  to  you — or  was  dear  to  you." 

"Can  you  evoke  such  a  spirit?" 

"I  don't  know.  I  never  can  promise,  but  I  '11 
try." 

She  leaned  back  in  the  chair  and  closed  her 
eyes.  The  man,  looking  at  her  from  across  the 
table,  was  startled  at  the  change  in  her  face.  For 
hers  was  that  type  of  face  which  is  dominated  by 
the  eyes.  Without  their  too  brilliant  light  it 
suffered  a  complete  loss  of  personality.  Words 
came  at  last  through  her  slightly  parted  lips. 
"There  is  some  one  who  wishes  to  speak  to  you. 
I  think  it  is  a  woman." 


122  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"A  woman!"  Kenwick  was  not  conscious  that 
his  tone  held  a  note  of  disappointment.  "Who 
is  she  V 

"I  can't  quite  get  the  name.  It 's  a  difficult 
control.  But  she  wants  very  much  to  talk  to 

you.  She  says It  will  be  hard  to  forgive  at 

first,  but  you  must  come  back." 

"Back  where?" 

The  voice  went  on,  unheeding.  "She  says 

that  she  was  influenced  by  some  one  else — some 
one  stronger.  You  must  look  for  that  man.  You 

must  never  stop  looking  for  him in  crowds 

and  everywhere  you  go  you  must  look.  And  when 
you  see  his  face  you  will  know  at  once  that  he  is 
the  one,  the  only  one  who  can  help  you.  He  is 
your  missing  link." 

There  was  a  long  pause.  "Anything  else?" 
Kenwick  inquired  at  last.  His  voice  was  guarded 
but  he  was  strangely  moved. 

"There  is  some  one  calling  to  you.  He  seems 
to  be  in  a  prison  and  he  is  looking  out  through 
iron  bars.  They  might  be  the  bars  of  a  gate.  I 
can't  see  the  face,  but  some  one  is  calling  your 


name." 


"Shall  I  answer  the  call?" 

"No.    There  would  be  no  use.    It  is  too  late 


now." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  123 

Her  eyes  opened  suddenly  and  met  Kenwick's 
fixed  upon  them  intent  but  inscrutable.  He 
stretched  his  hand  across  the  table. 

"Read  my  palm." 

She  held  it  only  a  moment  but  her  eyes  seemed 
to  take  in  its  every  line  at  a  glance.  "There  is 
a  perpetual  conflict  raging  in  your  soul,"  she  said. 

He  smiled.  "That  5s  true  of  most  people,  is  n't 
it?" 

Madame  Rosalie  had  a  superb  disregard  for 
irrelevancies.  "Part  of  you  is  eager  to  plunge 
gallantly  into  the  tasks  of  the  present,  but  the 
other  part  is  holding  you  back.  You  have  the 
drooping  head-line  with  the  introspective  fingers. 
It 's  a  bad  sign  on  the  hand  of  the  creative  tem 
perament.  And  you  are  some  kind  of  a  creative 
artist;  painter,  musician,  or  writer.  But  your 
head-line  did  n't  always  droop.  It 's  a  recent 
tendency,  so  you  have  a  good  chance  to  over 
come  it." 

"How  can  I  overcome  it?" 

"In  the  first  place,  give  up  all  idea  of  trying 
to  reconcile  yourself  with  the  past.  You  can't 
possibly  do  it  and  the  effort  may — wreck  you." 

He  got  to  his  feet  and  stood  looking  down  at 
her.  "There  does  n't  seem  to  be  much  ahead  for 
me,  does  there?"  he  said. 


124  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"There  is  everything  ahead;  all  the  tragedy  is 
behind  you."  She  was  still  looking  at  him  com 
passionately.  "You  are  too  young,"  she  said  at 
last. 

"Too  young  for  what?" 

"To  have  lost  so  much  out  of  your  life."  Her 
voice  was  like  red  coals  leaping  into  sudden  flame. 
It  startled  Kenwick.  "And  you  are  choosing 
just  the  wrong  way  to  wrestle  with  such  a  loss. 
You  had  originally  a  splendid  initiative,  an  im 
patient  desire  for  action.  But  the  artistic  side  of 
your  nature  has  assumed  control  of  you.  And 
the  artistic  temperament  is  long  on  endurance 
and  short  on  combativeness.  If  you  spent  one- 
third  of  the  time  fighting  this  specter  in  your 
past  that  you  spend  trying  to  reconcile  yourself 
to  it,  you  would  win  gloriously." 

For  a  few  moments  they  stood  beside  the  table 
talking  of  commonplaces.  Once  Kenwick  men 
tioned  Professor  Drew,  and  Madame  Rosalie 
smiled. 

"I'm  not  afraid  of  him,"  she  said.  "And 
neither  do  I  care  to  enter  into  a  public  debate 
with  him." 

She  followed  her  client  to  the  door.  "I  'm 
sorry  I  was  n't  able  to  help  you  more.  But  you 
are  not  ready  for  my  help  yet." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  125 

Kenwick  walked  back  to  the  "Clarion"  office 
with  these  words  ringing  in  his  ears.  The  mes 
sages  from  the  other  world  may  have  been  guess 
work,  but  at  least  she  was  a  shrewd  reader  of 
character.  And  contrary  to  all  his  expectations 
she  had  not  made  any  effort  to  win  him  for  a 
permanent  client. 

His  Sunday  story,  featuring  her  and  Professor 
Drew,  was  all  that  Boyer  had  hoped  for  it.  The 
astrologist  was  sketched  with  a  few  vivid  strokes, 
the  room  with  the  maroon-colored  curtains  more 
in  detail,  and  an  interview  reported  which 
thrilled  the  souls  of  the  credulous  and  held  even 
the  attention  of  the  skeptical.  There  was  neither 
ridicule  nor  championship  in  the  story,  and  the 
caustic  comments  of  Professor  Drew  were  bare 
of  journalistic  comment.  Altogether,  the  thing 
worked  up  well  and  made  a  hit.  After  reading 
it  during  his  late  breakfast  at  the  St.  Germaine, 
Kenwick  suddenly  decided  to  go  around  to  the 
Hartshire  Building  and  keep  his  promise  to 
Jarvis.  He  found  the  photographer  enveloped  in 
a  long  black  apron  and  rubber  gloves.  "Good 
boy!"  he  cried  slapping  his  visitor  on  the  back. 
"I  Ve  been  thinking  about  you  and  that  cursed 
story  you  told  me :  can't  get  the  blame  thing  out 
of  my  head.  That  was  good  stuff  about  the 


126  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

clairvoyant  in  the  'Clarion'  this  morning.  Where 
on  earth  do  you  dig  up  those  oddities?  I  recog 
nized  your  pen-name." 

He  hung  Kenwick's  coat  in  a  shallow  closet  as 
he  talked.  "You  are  in  the  nick  of  time  to  help 
me  with  an  experiment  if  you  will,"  he  went  on. 
"I  want  to  do  some  research  work  on  the  human 
eye  and  I  've  got  to  have  a  subject.  I  've  got  a 
lot  of  cards  here — featuring  optical  illusions  and 
that  sort  of  thing.  Do  you  mind  helping  me  for, 
say,  half  an  hour4?  You  see,  the  human  eye  and 
brain  are  the  ideal  apparatus  for  perfecting  the 
camera  and  I  'm  working  on  an  invention." 

Kenwick  complied  with  alacrity,  glad  of  the 
opportunity  to  get  his  mind  off  of  himself.  For 
almost  an  hour  Jarvis  worked  under  the  black 
hood  of  the  tripod  while  Kenwick  reported  on  the 
images  printed  upon  the  cards.  When  the  tests 
were  finished  and  he  rose  to  go,  the  photographer 
pushed  aside  his  paraphernalia  and  wiped  his 
forehead.  "Hot  as  Hades  under  that  thing!" 
he  cried.  "Say,  I  was  wondering  the  other  day 
if  you  play  golf." 

"I  used  to  go  out  and  play  with  my  brother  at 
his  club,"  Kenwick  replied.  "But  it 's  been  some 
time  ago;  I  'd  be  a  duffer  at  it  now." 

"Well,  I  've  got  a  card  that  will  let  us  into  the 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  127 

club  over  in  Claremont,"  Jarvis  explained.  "If 
you  have  n't  got  anything  better  to  do,  what  do 
you  say  that  we  meet  at  the  ferry  building  about 
two  o'clock  this  afternoon  and  play  a  few  holes 
over  on  the  course^  It's  a  great  day  to  be 
outside.  Can  you  make  it^" 

"Yes,  I  think  so."  For  a  moment  Kenwick 
stood  looking  at  his  host  with  an  expression  that 
puzzled  Jarvis.  Then  abruptly  he  turned  and 
went  away.  Up  the  steep  California  street  hills 
he  strode,  scarcely  conscious  of  the  effort  it  cost. 
For  a  horrible  dread  was  tearing  at  his  heart. 
It  was  not  a  new  sensation  to  him,  and  its  very 
familiarity  made  it  the  more  hideous;  that  per 
sistent  dread  known  only  to  those  who  are  strug 
gling  back  over  the  hard  road  of  mental  prostra 
tion.  The  seed  of  it  had  sprouted  on  the  morning 
when  he  had  bought  that  fatal  newspaper  at  the 
Third  and  Townsend  Depot.  And  during  the 
weeks  that  followed  its  tendrils  had  wrapped  a 
strangle-hold  about  his  life.  Sometimes  it  almost 
stopped  his  breathing.  And  as  yet  he  had  never 
seen  the  thing  that  he  dreaded.  It  was  not  yet 
upon  any  one's  face.  But  he  assured  himself 
desperately  that  some  day  he  would  see  it.  Some 
day,  when  perhaps  he  was  n't  thinking  about  it  at 
it  would  suddenly  leap  out  at  him.  In  the 


128  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

eyes  of  some  man  or  woman,  or  perhaps  even  some 
little  child,  he  would  see  suspicion  or  fear  or 
morbid  curiosity.  Without  being  told,  they 
would  know  suddenly  that  here  was  a  man  who 
had  once  lost  his  mental  grip.  They  would  be 
afraid  that  he  might  suddenly  lose  it  again,  and 
that  shuddering  fear  would  send  him  reeling 
backward  into  the  land  of  shadows  and  specters. 

He  stumbled  on  blindly,  and  through  the 
blackness  of  his  anguish  there  came  to  him  again 
the  curious  sensation  that  he  had  experienced  on 
his  second  night  at  Mont-Mer;  the  sensation  of 
having  lost  some  material  prop  that  could  restore 
his  courage. 

The  genial  suggestion  of  Jarvis  that  they  play 
golf  together  over  in  Claremont  was  like  a  cool 
hand  laid  upon  his  forehead.  To  Jarvis  he  must 
seem  sane  and  normal,  capable  at  least  of  ac 
quitting  himself  creditably  in  the  sport  of  sane 
and  normal  men.  He  ate  a  hasty  and  solitary 
lunch  and  at  two  o'clock  met  the  photographer  in 
front  of  the  flower-booth  in  the  ferry  building  for 
an  afternoon  at  the  country  club. 


CHAPTER  XI 

IT  was  Sunday  afternoon,  and  Marcreta  was 
expecting  a  caller.     "How  long  do  you  think 
he  '11  stay?'  Clinton  demanded  as  they  rose  from 
their  two  o'clock  dinner. 

"As  long  as  I  '11  let  him,  I  suppose." 

"Well,  call  a  time-limit,  Crete."  And  then  re 
called  suddenly  to  the  realization  that  he  must 
begin  making  the  best  of  a  situation  that  gave 
every  evidence  of  forcing  itself  upon  him  for  life, 
he  added  hastily,  "What 's  the  use  of  trying  that 
new  cure  if  you  're  going  to  pull  against  it  all  the 
time?' 

"Do  you  call  this  'pulling  against  it'  ?" 
"I  do,  decidedly.    Every  time  that  man  comes 
here  you  're  strung  about  an  octave  higher  than 
normal." 

She  looked  at  him,  astonished.  "Why,  Clin 
ton,  I  don't  feel  it  myself.  I'm  not  conscious 
that  he  affects  me  that  way." 

"He  does,  though.  We  all  know  people  who 
affect  us  that  way.  And  it  is  not  a  question  of 
attraction  or  aversion.  Liking  or  disliking  them 

129 


130  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

does  n't  alter  the  fact  that  they  have  the  power 
to  screw  us  up.  Sometimes,  of  course,  it 's  a 
beneficial  stimulant,  but  you  should  n't  be  taking 
anything  like  that  just  now.  Give  Dr.  Reynolds 
a  chance." 

"I  will  give  him  a  chance.  But  to-day 

Well,  I  promised  Mr.  Glover  that  I  'd  listen  to 
something  that  he  has  written." 

"Help !  Then  he  Jll  probably  be  here  to  sup 
per.  I  did  n't  know  he  'd  broken  into  the  writing 
game." 

"I  didn't  either  until  the  other  day.  But  I 
think  it  is  some  advertising  for  the  new  springs. 
He  is  very  versatile.  He  does  a  number  of  things 
and  does  them  well." 

Her  brother  glanced  at  her  sharply  without 
replying.  That  note  of  championship  in  her  voice 
put  an  edge  on  his  nerves. 

But  she  was  mistaken  in  her  guess  concerning 
advertising  matter  for  the  American  Carlsbad. 
For  when  she  and  Richard  Glover  were  alone  in 
the  living-room  he  produced  a  copy  of  one  of  the 
popular  magazines.  "You  remember  you  said 
I  might  read  you  something  to-day"?"  he  began, 
drawing  his  chair  into  a  better  light. 

"Yes.    I  have  been  looking  forward  to  it  with 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  131 

pleasure.  But  I  thought  it  would  be  in  manu 
script.  It  is  something  you  have  had  published4?" 

"My  first  attempt  at  anything  in  this  line.  It 's 
a  serial  story  and  this  is  the  initial  instalment. 
You  see,  I  had  a  good  deal  of  leisure  time  on  my 
hands  when  I  was  down  at  Mont-Mer  and  I  've 
always  wanted  to  try  my  luck  with  a  pen.  I  call 
this  'A  Brother  of  Bluebeard.' " 

"That 's  a  gruesome  title,  but  excellently 
chosen  if  it 's  a  mystery-story.  I  'm  shivering 
already." 

He  settled  himself  with  his  back  to  the  light 
and  his  profile  toward  her.  "I  may  as  well  tell 
you  at  first  that  I  am  not  bringing  this  out  under 
my  own  name." 

"Why  not?' 

"Because  I  would  n't  have  felt  quite  free  about 
writing  it  if  I  were  standing  out  in  the  open." 

"Oh,  it's  a  true  story?" 

"No,  I  can  hardly  claim  that  for  it.  It  Js 
rather  a  fantastic  plot  as  you  will  see.  But  every 
writer  knows  this,  that  when  you  first  break  into 
print  whatever  you  write  is  supposed  to  be 
transcribed  almost  verbatim  from  actual  experi 
ence,  preferably  your  own  experience.  No  mattef 
how  at  variance  with  your  own  life-plot  the  story 


132  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

may  be,  the  people  who  know  you  will  leap  to 
the  conclusion  that  it  is  rooted  in  autobiography. 
Imagination  is  the  very  last  thing  that  our  friends 
are  willing  to  allow  us." 

"What  nom-de-plume  do  you  use1?" 

"Ralph  Regan.  It 's  short  and  snappy  and 
sounds  as  if  it  might  be  genuine,  don't  you 
think?" 

He  found  the  place  and  began  to  read  in  a 
resonant,  well-modulated  voice.  The  opening 
paragraph  was  a  little  stilted,  a  bit  amateurish, 
but  after  that  the  story  swung  into  bold  and 
breathless  action.  It  gripped  its  hearer  with  a 
compelling  force  that  held  her  tense  and  motion 
less  in  her  chair.  Only  the  sound  of  the  reader's 
voice  and  the  crisp  crackle  of  paper  when  he 
turned  a  page  broke  the  quiet  of  the  room.  Out 
side,  a  gray  January  mist  engulfed  the  city,  and 
electric  bulbs  from  the  houses  across  the  street 
cut  bleary  patches  in  the  mantle  of  fog.  For 
almost  an  hour  Richard  Glover  read  in  his  clear, 
unhurried  voice,  and  Marcreta  listened,  her  wide 
eyes  fastened  upon  his  face. 

When  he  had  finished,  with  the  irritating 
promise,  "To  Be  Continued,"  he  laid  the  periodi 
cal  face-down  upon  the  library- table  and  turned 
toward  her.  In  his  amber  eyes  was  a  new  light. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  133 

A  railroad  switchman  who  faces  the  company's 
president  after  saving  a  train  from  destruction 
might  wear  just  that  expression. 

Marcreta  seemed  bereft  of  speech.  She  was 
staring  at  one  of  the  lights  in  the  house  across  the 
street  as  though  it  had  hypnotized  her.  One  of 
the  delicate  white  hands  was  clasped  tight  upon 
the  arm  of  her  chair.  Richard  Glover  told  him 
self  that  he  had  never  seen  her  look  so  beautiful. 
And  for  the  first  time  since  he  had  known  her, 
there  was  not  a  suggestion  of  invalidism  in  her 
tall,  regal  .figure.  She  was  wearing  a  filmy  gray 
dress  with  a  touch  of  pink  that  seemed  to  give  a 
heightened  flush  to  her  cheeks.  He  allowed 
several  seconds  to  pass.  Was  it  possible,  he  was 
wondering,  that  this  "first  story"  had  won  that 
tribute  most  coveted  by  all  authors — the  tribute 
of  breathless  silence  ? 

"Well?"  he  ventured  at  last.  "What  do  you 
think  of  it?" 

She  brought  her  eyes  back  to  the  room,  to  the 
magazine  lying  face-down  upon  the  table,  but 
not  to  him.  "I  think,"  she  said  with  a  long  sigh, 
"that  you  are  a  wonderfully  clever  man." 

The  light  flickered  out  of  his  eyes.  He  leaned 
toward  her  with  a  pleading  gesture.  "Is  that  all 
you  are  going  to  say  to  me?" 


134  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"Isn't  that  enough?  Wouldn't  you  rather 
have  me  say  that  than  anything  else?" 

"You  know  I  would  n't.  You  know  that  there 
are  many  other  things  that  I  would  far  rather 
have  you  say."  He  came  over  and  stood  beside 
her  chair.  "Marcreta,"  he  begged,  "say  just  one 
of  them.  Say  this — that  you  are  glad  to  have 
me  come  here.  I  wrote  that  story  for  you;  be 
cause  I  know  that  you  value  creative  power  more 
than  anything  else  in  the  world.  Are  you  glad 
that  I  did  it?  Are  you  glad  that  I  brought  it  to 
you?" 

She  was  looking  at  him  now,  all  her  ardent  soul 
in  her  eyes.  "I  am  glad,"  she  breathed.  "I  can't 
tell  you  how  glad." 

"Then  I  think  you  ought  to  give  me  some  re 
ward.  I  ought  to  have  at  least " 

She  put  out  her  hand  with  the  imperious  little 
gesture  that  he  had  come  to  know  well.  "Not 
just  now.  Please,  not  just  now.  You  see,  you 
have  rather — swept  me  off  my  feet.  Is  n't  that 
enough  for  one  day?" 

"It  is  enough,"  he  assured  her  exultantly.  And 
when,  a  few  moments  later,  he  climbed  into  the 
roadster  that  was  waiting  at  the  curb,  he  was  re 
peating  the  three  words  over  and  over  to  himself 
like  a  hilarious  refrain. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  135 

Just  at  dusk  Clinton  came  home  and  found  his 
sister  still  sitting  in  front  of  the  gas  logs  where 
Richard  Glover  had  left  her.  His  step  startled 
her  out  of  a  reverie.  "Oh,  it  Js  you,  Clint !  I  'm 
so  glad  you  've  come.  The  house  has  been  full  of 
ghosts." 

"I  suppose  so.    Glover  come?" 

"Yes.    He  has  come  and  gone." 

He  reached  down  swiftly  and  felt  one  of  her 
hands.  It  was  icy.  "Something  has  happened, 
Crete."  The  words  were  not  a  question,  but  they 
demanded  a  reply.  And  she  gave  it  without  hesi 
tation. 

"Yes,  something  has  happened.  I  Ve  got  to 
take  some  action  about  it  too,  but  I  have  n't  de 
cided  yet  what  it  shall  be." 

He  stood  on  the  hearth-rug  looking  down  at 
her  with  a  curious  mixture  of  annoyance  and  ad 
miration  in  his  eyes.  It  had  always  been  so,  he 
reflected.  About  the  trivial  things  of  life  she 
was  willing  to  abide  by  his  judgment,  but  in 
every  vital  issue  she  took  the  initiative  and 
pushed  her  own  convictions  through.  In  the 
moment  of  large  emergency  she  had  always  stood 
superbly  alone.  As  he  looked  at  her  a  half- 
audible  sigh  escaped  him.  After  all,  this  sem 
blance  of  vitality  was  but  the  ephemeral  stimu- 


136  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

lation  of  excitement.  And  he  dreaded  the  bleak 
reaction  from  it;  that  sudden  ebbing  away  of 
hope,  known  to  all  of  those  who  have  kept  long 
vigils  beside  sick  beds. 

"Let  me  manage  it,  whatever  it  is,"  he  com 
manded.  "I  've  told  you  before  that  you  're  not 
strong  enough  for  these  emotional  scenes.  It  is  n't 
as  if  you  were  a  well  woman." 

She  lapsed  into  silence,  and  he  felt  a  sharp 
twinge  of  self-reproach.  It  was  that  double- 
edged  remorse  that  chivalrous  strength  always 
feels  when  it  reminds  frailty  of  its  weakness. 

"Whatever  it  is,  Crete,"  he  hurried  on,  "can't 
you  defer  the  action  until  a  more  propitious  time? 
Can't  it  wait  until  you  are  stronger4?" 

A  little  choking  sound  came  from  her.  He 
stopped  short  in  swift  alarm.  Never  before  in 
all  the  long  years  of  her  semi-invalidism  had  she 
let  him  see  her  give  way  to  tears.  He  went  to 
her,  moving  uncertainly  as  though  through  un 
familiar  territory.  She  had  covered  her  face  with 
her  hands  as  though  she  could  shut  out  with  them 
the  sounds  of  passionate  sobbing. 

"I  '11  never  be  any  stronger,  Clint.  You  know 
it;  I  know  it.  Why  do  we  drag  on  with  this 
miserable  pretense?  Oh,  it  is  killing  me,  but  it 
takes  so  long.  Why  can't  I  die?" 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  137 

He  recoiled  before  that  cry,  before  the  havoc 
that  it  revealed  to  him.  Inwardly  he  cursed 
himself  and  then  he  remembered  Glover,  as  he 
might  have  remembered  a  gun  which  he  had  ac 
cidentally  discharged,  believing  it  to  be  unloaded. 
He  could  n't  endure  the  thought  that  he  had  hurt 
her  and,  manlike,  seized  upon  the  first  scapegoat 
that  offered  itself.  But  he  carefully  refrained 
from  a  mention  of  the  late  caller.  And  when 
he  spoke  his  voice  was  harsh  with  feeling.  "Crete, 
how  selfish  of  you.  If  you  should  die,  what 
would  become  of  me?" 

The  promptness  of  her  reply  struck  him  like  a 
blow.  "You  'd  marry.  You  're  over  thirty,  Clint, 
and  if  it  had  n't  been  for  me  you  would  have  been 
married  years  ago  and  would  be  living  a  normal 

life  in  a  home  of  your  own.  You  think " 

She  was  sitting  upright  now,  facing  him  with  a 
terrible  courage.  "You  think  I  don't  realize 
what  you  have  sacrificed.  Oh,  if  you  only  knew 
how  I  've  lain  awake  at  night,  staring  into  the 
dark,  praying  to  die  so  that  I  could  set  you  free. 
You  promised  mother.  I  've  always  known  that 
you  did.  But  even  if  you  had  n't,  you  would 
have  promised  yourself.  And  that 's  what  has 
'keyed  me  up,'  as  you  express  it.  That 's  what 
is  making  me  live  an  octave  higher  than  I  can 


138  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

stand.  It  is  n't — any  other  man  who  is  doing  it. 
It 's  you." 

He  sat  down  on  the  broad  arm  of  her  chair  as 
though  overcome  by  sudden  weakness.  "Well, 
thank  God  you  have  told  me  this,  Crete,  before 
it  eats  any  deeper  into  your  soul.  Sacrifice  you 
call  it.  But  sacrifice  involves  renunciation,  and 
I  have  never  renounced  any  woman  for  your  sake. 
I  have  never  been  engaged — nor  wanted  to  be." 

"But  you  ought  to,"  she  told  him  violently. 
"You  ought  to,  and  you  would  if  you  had  n't 
unconsciously  put  the  idea  away  from  you  so 
many  times.  You  ought  to  have  a  home  and  wife 
and  children.  Oh,  I  know  that  you  should,  and 
the  knowledge  has  made  me  desperate." 

A  dawning  suspicion  showed  in  his  eyes  and 
then  they  grew  hard.  "It  must  have,"  he  said 
coldly.  "It  must  have  made  you  very  desperate 
indeed — if  you  have  been  considering  Glover  as 
a  way  out." 

She  met  the  charge  without  resentment. 
"What  other  way  is  there  for  me^  You  see,  there 
would  n't  be  any  danger  of  my — caring  more  for 
somebody  else  afterward.  That  is  quite  beyond 
the  range  of  possibility  now,  so  it  would  be  safer 
for  me  than  for  some  women.  And  physical 
disability,  the  thing  that  made  me — that  would 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  139 

have  made  me  refuse  a  man  of  a  different  type, 
would  n't  count  at  all  with  him.  His  ambitions 
are  purely  material,  and  I  could  capitalize  them. 
That 's  all  he  wants.  It  would  really  be  quite  a 
fair  bargain." 

Clinton  Morgan  rose  slowly  and  stood  looking 
down  at  his  sister  as  though  she  were  a  stranger 
to  whom  he  had  just  been  introduced.  "Well, 
by  Gad!"  he  breathed,  and  for  a  moment  was 
bereft  of  further  speech.  And  then  his  words 
came  slowly,  and  more  as  the  detached  fragments 
of  a  soliloquy  than  a  response  to  her  own. 

"Crete,  of  all  women  in  the  world !  You,  with 
your  temperament !  With  an  idealism  that  I  and 
most  other  men  couldn't  touch  with  a  ten- foot 
pole — and  yet  you  'd  work  out  a  proposition  like 
that !  I  did  n't  know  that  you  saw  through 
Glover.  I  made  that  excuse  for  you,  that  you 
were  too  unsophisticated  to  see  through  him.  But 
sizing  him  up  for  an  adventurer,  you  frame  up  a 

contract  that Why,  I  '11  be  hanged  if  I  can 

believe  it,  Crete.  I  simply  can't  believe  it." 

She  made  no  defense,  and  he  went  on  in  the 
same  dazed  tone. 

"Go  out  on  the  street  and  pick  up  the  first  girl 
you  meet  and  bring  her  in  here.  If  I  should  make 
love  to  her  and  try  to  get  her  to  marry  me,  and 


140  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

succeed,  I'd  have  a  much  better  chance  of  happi 
ness  than  this  adventure  would  ever  give  you. 
For,  at  least,  I  'd  be  swimming  with  both  hands 
free.  Now  listen."  He  seemed  to  become  sud 
denly  aware  of  her  presence  again.  "When  I  fall 
in  love,  I  '11  begin  to  think  about  getting  married. 
But  I  'm  not  going  to  be  hurried  into  it  by  you 
or  anybody  else.  And  when  I  decide  to  marry, 
not  you  nor  anybody  else  shall  stand  in  my 
way." 

She  reached  for  him  with  a  convulsive  gesture. 
"Clinton,  do  you  mean  that?  Do  you  mean  that 
nobody  should*?" 

"I  pledge  you  my  word.  But  this  has  got  to  be 
a  bargain.  You  have  demonstrated  that  you 
know  how  to  make  one.  Now  don't  you  ever  let 
that  man  cross  this  threshold  again." 

"I  've  got  to,  Clint.  After  what  happened  this 
afternoon,  I  've  got  to  let  him  come — for  a 
while." 

"Why?" 

"Sit  down  and  let  me  tell  you  about  it.  I  '11 
have  to  tell  you,  or  it  will  eat  up  my  heart.  But 
the  thing  will  seem  incredible." 

"Not  to  me.  I  think  after  what  I've  just 
heard  that  I  can  believe  anything." 

"Well,  you  remember  that  I  told  you  he  had 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  141 

promised  to  read  me  something  that  he  had  writ 
ten?' 

"Yes,  advertising  matter  for  the  new  Carls 
bad." 

"I  thought  it  was  going  to  be  that  but  I  was 
mistaken.  It  was  advertising  matter,  but  not  for 
Carlsbad." 

"For  what,  then*?" 

"For  Richard  Glover." 

Clinton  grunted.  "I  see.  He  is  trying  to  win 
you  by  doing  the  Othello  stunt  on  paper." 

Marcreta  appeared  to  weigh  the  suggestion. 
"I  don't  think  it  is  entirely  that.  He  wants 
money  very  badly.  He  has  to  have  money,  a  lot 
of  it,  for  this  hotel  venture,  and  he  is  trying 
every  means  of  getting  it." 

"I've  always  been  led  to  believe,"  Clinton 
interposed,  "my  friends  who  write  have  always 
led  me  to  believe  that  story-writing  (and  I  as 
sume  that  this  was  some  sort  of  story)  is  rather 
an  uncertain  means  of  capitalization  for  a 


novice." 


"But  this  story  was  not  written  by  a  novice, 
Clint."  Marcreta's  voice  had  sunk  suddenly 
almost  to  a  whisper.  "It  was  written  by " 

"By  whom?" 

"Roger  Kenwick." 


142  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Clinton  Morgan  stiffened  'in  his  chair. 
11  What?"  he  cried.  "You  mean  to  say  that  he 
had  the  nerve  to  steal  the  thing  and  bring  it  out 
under  his  own  name4?" 

"He  is  too  clever  to  bring  it  out  under  his  own 
name.  He  chose  a  fictitious  name,  and  he 
changed  the  opening  paragraph.  But  except  for 
that  and  the  alteration  of  the  title,  I  pledge  you 
my  word,  Clint,  that  that  story  is  exactly  as 
Roger  Kenwick  read  it  to  me,  before  he  went  into 
the  service." 

There  was  a  moment  of  silence.  Clinton  was 
recalling  what  she  had  said  when  he  came  in 
about  ghosts.  He  scanned  her  face  uneasily. 
And  he  saw  in  it  the  new  expression  which  had 
startled  Richard  Glover.  For  the  first  time  in 
his  life  he  began  to  think  of  her  as  she  might 
be  if  she  were  unhampered  by  physical  infirmity. 
And  then  he  fell  to  wondering  what  had  passed 
between  her  and  Kenwick;  just  how  far  the 
tragedy  of  his  life  had  affected  her.  The  Morgan 
reserve  had  kept  her  completely  silent  upon  this 
subject  and  he  had  never  had  any  wish  to  intrude 
himself  into  her  confidence.  He  picked  up  the 
thread  of  the  story  where  she  had  dropped  it. 
"How  could  it  have  happened*?  And  how  did 
he  dare?' 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  143 

"I  can't  even  make  a  guess  at  how  it  happened, 

but  so  far  as  daring  goes Well,  as  I  said,  he 

is  desperate  for  money.  And  the  thing,  as  looked 
at  from  his  point  of  view,  was  not  so  very  risky. 
Why  should  it  be?  He  must  have  discovered  in 
some  way  that  the — the  author  was  not  a  possible 
source  of  trouble.  And  who  else  could  care  about 
it?  Never  in  his  wildest  dreams  would  any  one 
conjure  up  the  possibility  that  I  might  know.  He 
does  n't  have  the  least  idea,  of  course,  that  I  ever 
knew  the  real  author.  What  a  nemesis!  That 
he  should  have  chosen  me,  of  all  the  people  in  the 
world,  for  his  audience !  It 's  so  impossible  that 
he  will  never  suspect  it." 

"But  what  happened  after  he  had  finished? 
What  did  you  do?" 

"Nothing,  except  to  compliment  him  on  his 
cleverness  and  try  to  hide  every  emotion  that  I  've 
ever  had.  It  was  hard;  I  think  it's  the  hardest 
test  I  've  ever  had  to  meet.  But  it  has  given  me 
something  that  I  never  have  had  before."  Her 
voice  grew  husky  with  sudden  embarrassment. 
"O  Clint,  you  were  right  about  him.  I  've 
known  for  quite  a  long  time  that  you  were  right 
about  him,  but  I  couldn't  admit  it  to  myself; 
not  with  the  course  that  I  had  decided  to  take. 
But,  Clint,  although  I  knew  he  was  calculating 


144  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

and  sordid  and  insincere,  I  did  n't  know  this 
about  him.  I  did  n't  think  he  had  n't  a  sense  of 
honor.  If  I  had  suspected  that,  it  would  have 
made  everything  different.  But  you  can  see," 
she  went  on  eagerly,  "you  can  see  now  why  I 
must  let  him  go  on  coming  here  for  a  while? 
Why  I  can't  let  him  get  beyond  my  sight?" 

Her  brother  nodded.  "Give  him  enough  rope 
and  he  '11  hang  himself,  that 's  the  idea,  is  n't  it?" 

"I  've  got  to  be  very  careful,  you  see.  He  has 
told  me  a  good  many  things  about  himself  of  late, 
and  I  'm  trying  to  fit  them  all  together.  Some  of 
them  don't  match  at  all.  And  now  that  he  has 
revealed  himself,  I  'm  beginning  to  doubt  every 
thing.  That  Mont-Mer  secretaryship,  for  in 
stance,  looks  very  improbable  to  me  now.  I  've 
questioned  him  about  several  prominent  people 
down  there,  and  he  does  n't  seem  to  have  heard 
of  any  of  them." 

"Well,  don't  worry  any  more  about  it  just  now, 
Crete.  Let 's  hustle  something  to  eat  and  call  it 
a  day." 

When  his  sister  had  gone  to  bed  that  night 
Clinton  sat  for  a  long  time  in  the  library,  staring 
into  the  fireplace.  The  little  scene  which  had 
been  enacted  there  a  few  hours  earlier  had  stirred 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  145 

him  to  the  depths  of  his  being.  It  brought  him 
perplexity  and  a  poignant  self-reproach.  The 
fact  that  she  was  not  the  crying  type  of  woman 
made  her  'emotional  abandon  a  particularly 
haunting  thing. 

"1 5ve  been  an  awful  ass,"  he  muttered.  "I 
can't  see  just  now  where  it  is  exactly  that  I  failed. 
But  it 's  evident  that  somewhere  along  the  line 
I  've  acted  like  one  of  the  early  Christian 
martyrs." 

He  picked  up  a  little  volume  that  was  lying 
at  his  elbow.  It  was  a  dainty  thing  bound  in  gold 
and  ivory.  He  remembered  that  Roger  Kenwick 
had  given  it  to  his  sister  on  that  last  night  when 
he  had  come  to  bid  her  good-by.  He  had  never 
looked  into  it  before.  Now  he  turned  the  pages 
idly.  It  was  modern  verse,  and  he  read  inter 
mittently  here  and  there.  Among  the  leaves  he 
came  at  last  upon  a  folded  bit  of  paper.  It  was 
in  Marcreta's  handwriting;  evidently  something 
that  she  had  copied.  He  tilted  it  under  the  light 
and  read  the  trio  of  stanzas. 


I  cannot  drive  thee  from  my  memory; 

I  cannot  live  and  tear  thee  from  my  heart. 
Is  there  no  corner  of  oblivion's  realm 

Whence  thy  uneasy  spirit  may  depart? 


146  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

If  love  were  dead,  if  love  could  only  die, 
And  leave  me  desolation  and  despair; 

The  emptiness  of  day,  the  aching  night, 
All  these  at  last  my  soul  could  learn  to  bear. 

But  ever  when  I  think  thy  fire  is  spent 

And  seek  the  peace  of  death's  all-sacred  pain, 

Behold,  comes  Memory  with  her  torch  a-light — 
And  all  my  altar  flames  to  life  again. 

Clinton  Morgan  folded  the  bit  of  paper  with 
reverent  fingers.  For  he  knew,  all  at  once,  that 
this  was  not  a  copy  of  anything,  but  that  he  had 
unwittingly  torn  aside  the  veil  of  his  sister's  se 
cret  soul.  He  felt  all  of  the  honorable  man's 
repugnance  against  outraged  decency.  The  scrap 
of  paper  seemed  to  scorch  his  fingers.  With  a 
punctilious  regard  for  detail,  which  he  knew  to 
be  absurd,  he  tried  to  find  the  exact  page  where 
it  had  been  concealed.  Then  he  put  the  volume 
back  upon  the  table  and  went  over  to  the  win 
dow.  His  conjectures  concerning  this  romance 
had  come  to  an  end.  Now  he  knew,  and  knowing 
felt  suddenly  weighted  with  guilt. 

He  could  imagine  now  how  she  must  have  felt 
as  she  had  sat,  a  few  hours  before,  listening  to 
the  paragraphs  of  Ken  wick's  masterpiece  as  they 
fell  from  the  glib  tongue  of  Richard  Glover. 
There  was  an  expression  almost  of  awe  upon  his 
face.  She  could  write  all  that,  feel  all  that  for 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  147 

one  man,  and  then  deliberately  plan  to  marry 
another,  to  set  him  free !  The  thing  seemed  pre 
posterous,  and  yet  he  knew  it  to  be  true. 

And  then  his  thoughts  reverted  to  Kenwick, 
and  the  days  that  now  seemed  almost  like  the 
unreal  days  of  a  dream,  when  he  had  first  known 
him  over  at  the  fraternity-house  in  Berkeley.  He 
recalled  the  night  when  he  had  brought  him  home 
to  dinner  and  introduced  him  to  Marcreta  and 
tried  to  make  him  show  off  for  her  like  a  trained 
puppy.  Perhaps  it  would  have  been  better  if  he 
had  never  brought  him.  But  these  things  were 
in  the  hands  of  fate  and  fate  has  an  infinite  num 
ber  of  tools.  Standing  there  at  the  window, 
gazing  at  the  reflection  of  the  gas  logs  mirrored 
against  the  black  pane,  he  found  himself  growing 
suddenly  resentful  of  the  casual  emergencies  of 
life.  Mere  cobweb  threads  they  were  but  upon 
them  hung  the  destinies  of  human  souls.  You 
turned  the  first  corner  instead  of  the  second  in  an 
hour  of  aimless  wandering,  and  the  circulation 
of  your  life  current  was  completely  changed.  It 
was  folly  to  believe  that  all  the  corners  were 
posted  with  signs  to  be  read  and  heeded  by  that 
secret  autocrat,  the  subconscious  mind.  The  in 
tricacies  of  such  a  universe  made  the  brain  reel. 
It  was  better  to  believe  that  we  played  the  game 


148  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

blind,  and  that  the  stakes  were  to  the  courageous. 

He  went  back  to  the  table  and  turned  out  the 
reading-lamp,  blotting  out  the  sight  of  the  white 
and  gold  book. 

"Lord!  What  a  pity!"  he  murmured.  "She 
would  have  been  such  an  inspiration  to  him.  It 
was  the  devil's  own  luck.  Poor  Kenwick !  Poor 
little  Crete!" 


CHAPTER  XII 

MADAME  ROSALIE  was  setting  her  stage 
for  a  caller.  It  was  evidently  to  be  an 
important  client,  for  cards,  crystal,  horoscope, 
ouija-board,  and  other  handmaidens  to  divination 
were  set  forth  upon  the  table  in  the  dim  back 
parlor.  The  priestess  herself,  in  her  garnet- 
colored  robe,  moved  about  the  room  with  the 
noiselessness  of  a  shadow.  Although  it  was 
barely  dusk  she  drew  the  shades  and  swung  the 
electric  bulb  over  the  end  of  the  table.  Then 
she  stood  surveying  her  work  with  the  critical 
scrutiny  of  an  artist  experimenting  for  the  best 
light  upon  his  picture.  Her  too-brilliant  eyes 
roved  restlessly  from  one  carefully  arranged  de 
tail  to  another. 

Suddenly  a  footstep  sounded  outside,  and  there 
was  a  buzz  of  the  electric  bell.  Madame  Rosalie 
waited  exactly  the  correct  length  of  time  before 
responding  to  its  summons.  The  interval  was 
expressive  neither  of  eagerness  nor  indifference. 

When  she  returned  to  her  sanctum  it  was  to  usher 

149 


150  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

into  it  a  man  who  moved  hurriedly,  drew  off  a 
pair  of  heavy  driving-gloves,  and  tossed  them 
into  the  Morris-chair.  The  astrologist  removed 
them  quietly  to  a  settee  in  a  far  corner  of  the 
apartment  and  seated  herself  in  the  chair. 

"They  say  you  're  the  eighth  wonder  of  the 
world."  Her  visitor  spoke  with  a  thinly  veiled 
sarcasm  as  he  took  his  place  under  the  light.  "I 
might  as  well  tell  you  at  the  outset  that  I  don't 
go  in  much  for  this  sort  of  thing.  I  'm  here  upon 
the  suggestion  of  somebody  else.  I  've  known  a 
good  many  of  you  trance  mediums  and  my  ex 
perience  has  been  that  you  're  strong  on  the  fu 
ture  and  weak  on  the  past.  You  play  safer  that 
way.  But  it  happens  that  I  want  help  with  the 
past  more  than  with  the  future.  What 's  the 
idea  now?  Are  you  going  to  hypnotize  me*?" 

His  voice  was  not  antagonistic,  only  briskly 
businesslike.  He  might  have  been  suggesting 
that  he  try  on  the  suit  of  clothes  which  a  salesman 
was  proffering  for  his  favor. 

Madame  Rosalie  answered  in  the  low,  slightly 
indifferent  voice  that  had  surprised  Roger  Ken- 
wick.  "Hypnotism  is  a  cooperative  measure.  I 
could  n't  hypnotize  you  unless  you  were  willing 
and  would  help  me." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  151 

He  laughed.  "That  Js  a  good  deal  for  you  to 
admit.  Most  of  you  people  claim  to  be  able  to 
do  anything." 

"Do  you  wish  me  to  try  to  hypnotize  you?" 

"No,  I  don't  care  about  it  especially.  It  takes 
a  lot  of  time,  does  n't  it?  Get  busy  on  something 
that  comes  right  down  to  brass  tacks." 

She  turned  the  crystal  sphere  slowly  in  her 
hand.  "You  are  obsessed  by  a  fear,  and  you  have 
reason  to  be.  There  is  a  very  serious  problem 
confronting  you,  and  you  need  help  in  solving  it. 
I  can't  help  you,  but  perhaps  I  can  find  some  one 
else  who  can." 

She  gathered  up  a  bundle  of  cards.  At  first 
glance  he  had  thought  they  were  playing-cards, 
but  he  saw  now  that  the  reverse  sides  were  all 
blanks.  "On  each  of  these  I  am  going  to  write 
a  word,"  she  explained.  "I  '11  hold  it  for  an  in 
stant  before  your  eyes.  Read  it,  close  your  eyes, 
and  then  look  at  those  maroon-colored  curtains 
over  there." 

Without  comment  he  followed  these  instruc 
tions.  Ten  minutes  passed  while  the  client  glanced 
at  the  cards  and  then  at  the  curtains.  Some 
times  his  gaze  strayed  back  to  the  bit  of  paste 
board  before  the  medium  had  another  one  ready. 


152  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

By  the  end  of  the  hour  she  had  cast  his  horoscope, 
read  his  palm,  and  performed  other  mystic  rites. 
Then  she  settled  back  in  the  deep  chair  and  an 
nounced  herself  ready  to  "project  the  astral 
body."  A  few  moments  passed  in  absolute  si 
lence.  The  medium  appeared  to  fall  into  a  light 
slumber,  and  the  man  on  the  other  side  of  the 
table  was  prepared  to  see  her  face  contorted  by 
the  writhing  pains  of  the  trance  victim.  But  it 
remained  calm,  almost  deathlike.  His  shrewd 
eyes  were  sizing  her  up  as  she  slept.  He  seemed 
almost  to  forget  that  he  had  come  for  spiritual 
counsel,  and  his  gaze  was  calculating,  specula 
tive,  as  though  he  were  considering  her  possi 
bilities  as  an  ally.  Suddenly  a  voice  came  from 
the  depths  of  the  chair.  It  made  him  jump.  It 
was  not  the  voice  of  Madame  Rosalie,  but  one 
that  seemed  vaguely  familiar. 

"Marstan  is  dead."  T1  ^  words  died  away  in 
a  kind  of  moan.  After  an  interval  of  silence 
came  the  message,  "He  says  to  tell  you  that  you 
have  found  the  criminal,  and  now  is  the  time  to 
act."  She  seemed  to  sink  deeper  into  oblivion. 
The  client  waited  a  full  minute.  Then  he  leaned 
over  and  whispered  through  the  stillness  two 
words— "Rest  Hollow." 

The  medium's  head  rolled  from  side  to  side  on 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  153 

the  cushions  of  the  chair,  like  that  of  a  surgical 
patient  who  is  trying  to  escape  the  ether  sponge. 
"Gone!"  she  muttered.  "All  gone!" 

He  swept  aside  the  cards  and  ouija-board  and 
leaned  closer,  his  hands  almost  touching  hers. 
The  amused  skepticism  had  died  out  of  his  amber 
eyes,  and  the  question  that  he  asked  came  in  a 
tense  whisper.  "Where  is  Ralph  Regan ?" 

A  frown  drew  the  woman's  heavy  black 
brows  together.  "Gone!"  she  murmured  again. 
"Gone!" 

It  was  not  possible  for  him  to  determine  from 
her  tone  whether  she  was  answering  his  last  ques 
tion  or  merely  repeating  her  response  to  "Rest 
Hollow."  He  tried  again. 

And  after  a  moment  the  reply  came  slowly 
through  stiff  lips.  "The  way  leads  over  a  curving 
road.  Follow  that  road  to  a  place  with  a  high 
stone  fence  where  the  gates  stand  always  open. 
There  you  will  find  him." 

He  settled  back  in  his  chair,  his  eyes  resting, 
fascinated,  upon  the  graven  face. 

"Marstan  is  here."  She  spoke  in  her  own  voice 
now  and  there  was  in  it  a  note  of  infinite  weari 
ness.  "He  has  something  to  say  to  you." 

The  man  smiled  grimly.  "I  should  think  he 
would.  Tell  him  to  go  ahead ;  I  'm  listening." 


154  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"He  says  you  must  give  up  the  first  plan " 

She  frowned  in  the  effort  of  transmission.  "And 
the  second  plan — and  try  the  third.  He  says 
there  is  a  woman  working  in  the  plan  too:  she 
has  just  begun  to  work  in  it.  You  must  get  her 
aid  or  she  might " 

He  leaned  forward  eagerly.  "Yes*?  She 
might  what*?" 

"I  don't  quite  get  it.  It 's  a  difficult  control. 
But  he  seems  to  be  afraid  of  that  woman.  He 
wants  very  much  to  warn  you  against " 

She  shivered  slightly  and  opened  her  eyes. 
The  man  had  left  his  seat  and  was  standing  close 
to  her  side.  "I  hope  you  got  what  you  want," 
she  said  wearily.  "I  don't  know  when  I  've  had 
a  sitting  that  has  cost  so  much." 

He  crossed  to  the  settee  and  picked  up  his 
gloves.  "It  must  get  on  your  nerves.  Suppose 
we  go  out  somewhere  and  have  a  little  bite  of 
supper.  I  know  a  place  down  on  Dupont;  no 
style  about  it,  but  they  give  you  a  great  little 
meal.  What  do  you  say?" 

She  glanced  at  the  nickel  clock  upon  the 
mantel.  "It 's  almost  seven,"  she  demurred, 
"and  I  expect  another  client  at  seven-thirty." 

"No  more  sittings  to-night,"  he  decreed.  There 
was  an  almost  insolent  authority  in  his  tone. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  155 

"Time  to  call  a  halt.  It 's  dinner-time  in  heaven, 
and  spirits  must  live.  You  're  coming  out  with 
me.  Get  on  your  street  togs,  little  witch." 

Without  further  protest  she  obeyed  while  her 
escort  waited  in  the  shabby  entrance-hall.  At 
the  curb  he  helped  her  into  the  roadster,  and  five 
minutes  later  they  were  seated  at  a  small  bare 
table  in  one  of  the  popular  bohemian  restaurants 
of  the  downtown  district. 

"No  Martinis  any  more,"  he  sighed,  as  he 
helped  her  out  of  her  cheap  coat  with  its 
imitation-fur  collar.  "Life  is  n't  what  it  used 
to  be,  is  it'?"  His  own  hat  and  expensive-looking 
overcoat  he  hung  upon  the  peg  in  a  diamond- 
shaped  mirror  bearing  the  soap- written  injunc 
tion,  "Try  Our  Tamales."  "But  they  serve  a 
placid  little  near-beer  in  this  place  that  helps 
some.  Bring  two,  waiter." 

When  the  attendant  returned  with  the  glasses, 
he  tossed  off  the  contents  of  his  at  a  gulp,  but  the 
woman  sipped  hers  with  the  leisurely  enjoyment 
of  the  epicure.  Then  she  set  it  down  and  stabbed 
with  her  fork  at  the  dish  of  green  olives  in  the 
center  of  the  table. 

The  soup  came,  a  rich  bean  chowder,  which 
she  ate  almost  in  silence,  while  her  companion 
commented  casually  upon  the  service  and  fur- 


156  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

nishings  of  the  cafe.  They  had  a  rear  table  near 
the  swinging  doors  that  led  into  the  kitchen.  It 
was  not  more  or  less  conspicuous  than  any  of  the 
others.  The  atmosphere  of  unconventionality 
which  pervaded  the  place  seemed  to  envelop  all 
its  habitues  in  a  sort  of  mystic  veil  that  was  in 
itself  a  guarantee  of  privacy.  At  the  table  near 
est  them  a  girl  was  talking  earnestly  to  a  man 
who  sat  with  his  arm  about  her.  Madame 
Rosalie,  raising  her  eyes  from  her  soup-plate,  en 
countered  the  bold,  appraising  stare  of  her  escort. 
She  returned  it  impersonally  and  with  the  flicker 
of  a  smile,  taking  in  the  "freckled"  eyes  and  the 
large  thin  hands.  And  when  she  smiled  her  face 
regained  something  of  a  former  beauty.  The 
man  leaned  toward  her  with  a  consciously  confid 
ing  manner.  "You  call  yourself  Madame 
Rosalie,"  he  said.  "But  is  n't  it  really  Mademoi 
selle?" 

Her  smile  deepened  but  she  gave  him  no  an 
swer.  In  the  delicate,  lacy  waist  and  white  skirt 
which  she  had  donned,  she  looked  years  younger. 
There  was  a  ruby  pendant  at  her  throat  but  she 
wore  no  other  jewel.  The  garish  light  of  the 
cafe,  shining  upon  her  straight  black  hair,  gave 
it  a  luster  that  was  like  the  dull  gleam  of 
jet. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  157 

"Not  Mademoiselle*?"  he  queried  again,  and 
his  smile  was  like  the  password  between  two 
brother  lodge-members. 

And  then  Madame  Rosalie  lost  some  of  her  in 
scrutable  reserve.  "Not  Rosalie"  she  corrected. 
"But  it 's  a  good  name ;  as  good  as  any  other  for 
my  trade,  don't  you  think *?" 

He  turned  one  of  the  clumsy  glass  salt- 
shakers  between  his  fingers.  "The  name  is  all 
right,"  he  admitted.  "But — why  do  you  do — 
that  sort  of  thing4?  You  admit  yourself  that  it  Js 
hard  on  your  nerves.  Why  do  you  do  it — when 
you  could  do  other  things'?" 

The  waiter  reappeared  and  littered  the  table 
with  an  army  of  small  oval  platters.  Odors  of 
highly  seasoned  macaroni  and  ragout  steamed 
from  them.  Madame  Rosalie  dipped  daintily 
into  the  nearest  dish.  But  in  spite  of  her  re 
straint,  it  would  have  been  apparent  to  a  close 
observer  that  her  enjoyment  of  the  meal  was  the 
keen  avidity  of  one  who  has  been  long  denied. 
When  the  waiter  was  out  of  hearing,  she  caught 
up  the  last  words  sharply. 

"What  do  you  mean  by  'other  things'*?"  For 
the  first  time  her  voice  was  eager,  as  though  seek 
ing  counsel. 

He  shrugged.     "I  don't  pretend  to  be  a  clair- 


158  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

voyant.  Yet  I  know  that  there  are  other  things 
that  you  could  do — have  done." 

"How  do  you  know  it?" 

"Well,  in  the  first  place,  if  you  had  been  a 
medium  for  very  long,  the  clever  medium  that 
you  undoubtedly  are,  you  would  have  made  more 
money  at  it." 

"I  have  made  money  at  it." 

"Not  as  much  as  you  should  have  made.  You 
wouldn't  live  as  you  do  if  you  had  money." 

If  she  resented  this  assertion,  she  gave  no  sign 
of  it,  and  he  went  on  with  the  cool  assurance  of 
a  physician  who  is  certain  of  his  diagnosis.  "You 
may  persuade  yourself  that  you  are  in  that  busi 
ness  because  you  are  interested  in  it  or  because 
you  know  that  you  have  an  unaccountable  power. 
But  you  are  doing  it  chiefly  for  the  same  reason 
that  most  of  us  ply  our  trades ;  because  you  want 
to  make  money." 

"Well?"  She  commented,  "It  does  supply  me 
with  a  living,  and  you  know  there  's  a  theory 
that  we  must  live." 

He  laughed.  "You  don't  have  to  live  the  way 
you  do.  There  are  much  easier  ways  for  you  to 
accomplish  that  end.  Have  you  got  anybody 
dependent  on  you?" 

"No,  but  I  am  horribly  in  debt."    The  admis- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  159 

sion  seemed  to  slip  from  her  without  her  permis 
sion,  and  when  the  words  were  out  a  little  frown 
puckered  her  forehead.  The  eyes  of  her  escort 
were  fixed  upon  the  ruby  pendant,  so  obviously 
a  genuine  and  costly  stone.  She  toyed  absently 
with  it,  putting  a  cruel  strain  upon  its  slender 
thread-like  chain  of  gold.  "Do  you  know,"  she 
said  slowly,  "I  believe  you  would  make  a  won 
derful  hypnotist.  I  believe  that  you  could  even 
hypnotize  me." 

The  bold  amber  eyes  gazed  straight  into  hers. 
"But  you  told  me,  didn't  you,  that  hypnotism 
had  to  be  a  cooperative  measure?  You  said,  I 
remember,  that  nobody  could  hypnotize  anybody 
else  unless — unless  the  victim  were  willing." 

One  of  his  hands  closed  over  hers  as  it  reached 
for  the  sugar-bowl.  She  made  no  effort  to  draw 
it  away. 

"Perhaps,"  she  answered  softly,  "perhaps  the 
victim  is  willing." 

He  stacked  up  a  little  pile  of  the  oval  platters 
and  pushed  them  impatiently  to  one  side.  "I 
guess  we  understand  each  other  all  right,"  he  said. 
"You  need  me  and  I  need  you.  We  've  each 
come  to  the  place  where  we  need  help.  Now  let  Js 
not  waste  any  more  time  about  it.  Let's  get 
down  to  brass  tacks." 


CHAPTER  XIII 

IT  was  seven  o'clock  on  a  rainy  evening,  and 
Kenwick  turned  up  the  collar  of  his  coat  as 
he  left  the  St.  Germaine.  Inside  the  Hartshire 
Building  there  was  a  cheerful  warmth  that  prom 
ised  well  for  the  evening.  He  ignored  the  ele 
vator  and  walked  up  the  three  flights  of  stairs  to 
the  floor  where  the  photographer  had  his  rooms. 
On  the  way,  he  tried  to  persuade  himself  that  he 
was  not  doing  this  in  order  to  gain  time.  But 
there  was  a  good  hour  intervening  between  now 
and  time  to  start  for  the  theater,  and  at  the  end 
of  that  hour,  he  reflected  Jarvis  might  not  care 
to  keep  the  engagement. 

As  he  toiled  upward  Kenwick  considered  every 
possible  detail  of  the  scene  that  was  before  him, 
and  then  wearily  discarded  them  all.  "Why  do 
I  do  it?"  he  challenged  himself,  as  he  reached  the 
last  landing.  "How  do  I  dare  to  do  it*?  My 
God!  I  can't  afford  to  do  it;  I've  got  to  have 
one  friend  left!" 

But  as  he  had  once  told  Jarvis,  those  scenes 

160 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  161 

of  life  whose  settings  are  scrupulously  ordered 
usually  lack  dramatic  climax.  At  the  end  of 
what  he  was  pleased  to  characterize  as  his  "con 
fession,"  the  photographer  surveyed  him  with 
sympathetic  but  unastonished  eyes. 

"1 'd  begun  to  think  that  there  might  be  some 
thing  personal  in  it,"  he  commented.  "I  could 
see  that  there  was  something  lying  heavy  on  your 
chest.  It 's  a  devilish  mess,  is  n't  it?" 

The  other  man  was  looking  at  him  with  a 
disconcerting  sharpness.  But  the  thing  for  which 
he  probed  was  not  in  Granville  Jarvis's  eyes. 

"I  seem  to  be  such  a  helpless  sort  of  brute,"  his 
host  went  on,  and  pushed  a  box  of  cigars  across 
the  table  as  though  in  an  unconscious  effort  to 
make  up  with  tobacco  what  he  lacked  in  counsel. 
"I  never  can  think  of  the  right  thing  to  do  just 
on  the  spur  of  the  minute.  Inspiration  has  an 
uncomfortable  habit  of  failing  to  keep  her  en 
gagements  with  me." 

"I  did  n't  expect  any  advice,"  Kenwick  told 
him.  "But  it 's  a  relief  to  tell  you  and  get  it  off 
my  mind;  to  tell  you  and  yet  not  have  you  think 
that  I  ought  to  be  locked  up." 

"Somebody  ought  to  be  locked  up,"  Jarvis  re 
marked  grimly.  "And  it 's  your  job  to  find  that 
person.  Why  don't  you  go  East*?" 


162  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"I  am  going  East.  I  've  decided  to  go  next 
week.  It  would  be  hard  to  make  you  understand 

why  I  have  n't  done  it  before,  but Well,  this 

sort  of  an — illness  does  a  terrible  thing  to  a  man's 
soul,  Jarvis.  It  paralyzes  his  initiative.  It  gives 
him  the  most  deadly  thing  in  this  world;  the  pa 
tience  of  despair.  I  }m  constantly  waiting  for 
things  to  clear  up  instead  of  going  at  them  ham 
mer  and  tongs." 

His  companion  nodded.  "I  think  I  under 
stand.  It  would  be  the  hell  of  a  situation  for 
you  back  there  among  people  you  've  always 
known,  and  who  presumably  know  all  about  you, 
and  not  being  able  to  bridge  the  gap.  I  can  see 
why  you  wanted  to  get  a  line  on  yourself  first, 
and  you  're  right,  too.  After  all,  a  man  owes 
something  to  his  nervous  system.  But  since 
you  've  decided  to  go  and  brave  it  out  back  there 
I  think  I  'd  let  things  rest  the  way  they  are  till 
you  go.  Sometimes  life  works  itself  out  better 
if  we  don't  interfere  too  much.  Somebody  is 
bound  to  make  a  foolish  play  if  you  let  them  all 
manage  their  own  hands." 

"And  yet  somebody  told  me  the  other  day, 
Jarvis,  that  I  was  too  passive  in  the  crutches  of 
fate;  that  I  ought  to  be  more  combative,  more 
aggressive." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  163 

Jarvis  laughed.  "I  'd  be  willing  to  bet  that  it 
was  a  woman  who  told  you  that." 

"Yes,  a  woman  did  tell  me.  It  was  that  trance 
medium." 

"I  might  have  guessed  it.  By  the  way,  I  went 
to  see  her  myself  the  other  day.  Your  story  got 
me  interested.  She  ought  to  have  paid  you  a 
liberal  commission  for  that  yarn.  But  I  suppose 
she  does  n't  even  know  you  wrote  it.  She  struck 
me  as  being  a  mighty  clever  little  woman.  Well, 
it 's  after  eight  o'clock.  Let  Js  go." 

They  found  their  seats  in  the  first  row  of  the 
balcony.  The  house  was  brilliantly  lighted  and 
filling  up  rapidly.  But  although  Jarvis  had 
urged  his  companion  to  forget  for  a  time  the 
tangle  in  which  he  was  enmeshed,  it  was  he  who 
returned  to  the  theme  while  they  sat  waiting  for 
the  curtain  to  rise. 

"The  trouble  is,  there 's  a  missing  link  in  the 
chain  somewhere.  I  don't  mean  an  event,  but  a 
person.  Somebody  dealt  those  cards,  of  course, 
and  whoever  did  it  knows  where  the  marked  one 
is.  The  New  York  trip  may  be  a  wild  goose 
chase  after  all.  Did  you  ever  think  of  hiring  a 
detective  to  help  you  out?" 

"Yes,  I  've  thought  of  it  a  lot.  But  somehow 
I  don't  want  to  do  it.  I  don't  want  to  have  any- 


164  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

body  mixed  up  in  my  affairs  as  intimately  as 
that.  I  can't  explain  my  feeling  about  it.  But 
there  is  so  much  noise  about  this  sort  of  thing  if 
it  once  rises  to  the  surface,  and  if  there  Js  any 
graft  connected  with  my  name,  I  'd  like  to  keep 
the  scandal  private.  Besides,"  he  laughed  with 
a  tolerant  self-indulgence,  "I  don't  suppose  the 
person  lives,  Jarvis,  who  does  n't  believe  that 
way  down  inside  of  him  somewhere,  sleeping  but 
never  dead,  is  the  genius  of  the  detective.  I  've 
made  a  sort  of  a  covenant  with  myself  that  I  and 
no  other  shall  run  this  thing  to  cover,  and  do  it 
without  kicking  up  a  noise." 

Jarvis  was  staring  speculatively  at  the  foot 
lights.  "It 's  one  of  the  most  curious  cases  I  ever 
knew.  I  '11  tell  you  what,  Ken  wick.  You  're 
the  original  'Wise  Man  from  Our  Town.'  Re 
member  him? 

"And  when  he  found  his  eyes  were  out, 

With  all  his  might  and  main, 
He  jumped  into  the  bramble-bush 
And  scratched  them  back  again." 

"A  dangerous  experiment,  I  always  thought," 
Kenwick  remarked. 

"So  is  dynamite,  but  sometimes  we  have  to  use 
it,  and  nothing  else  will  take  its  place." 

"Are  you  advising  me  to  put  a  bomb  under 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  165 

somebody  on  the  chance  that  it  might  be  the 
man  who  shuffled  the  deck?" 

"No.  I  'm  advising  you  to  do  the  bramble- 
bush  stunt.  Don't  jump  forward;  jump  back." 

"What  do  you  mean?" 

"Why,  the  more  I  think  of  it  the  more  I  be 
lieve  that  the  solution  of  this  mystery  is  to  be 
found  in  the  place  where  it  began." 

"But  where  did  it  begin?" 

"So  far  as  your  knowledge  of  it  extends,  it 
began  in  the  canon  or  ravine  or  whatever  place  it 
was  that  you  had  the  accident.  If  I  'm  not  mis 
taken,  Kenwick,  that  place  is  your  bramble- 
bush." 

The  curtain  rose  upon  the  first  act  and  there 
was  no  opportunity  for  further  conversation.  It 
was  during  the  intermission  between  the  second 
and  third  acts  that  Jarvis,  leaning  over  the  bal 
cony,  said  suddenly,  "There  's  a  friend  of  yours; 
fourth  row  on  the  right." 

Kenwick  made  a  cursory  examination  of  the 
seats  and  shook  his  head.  "Don't  see  him.  Don't 
see  anybody  I  know  here  to-night  except  Aiken, 
our  dramatic  critic." 

"This  is  a  woman.  Count  seven  seats  over  in 
the  fourth  row.  Is  n't  that  lady  in  the  garnet- 
colored  coat  your  Madame  Rosalie?" 


166  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"You're  right;  it  is." 

"I  thought  I  could  n't  be  mistaken.  There  Js  a 
certain  air  of  distinction  about  that  woman  in 

spite  of "  Jar  vis  stopped,  for  he  saw  that  his 

companion  was  not  listening.  For  a  moment 
Kenwick  sat  there  staring  down  at  the  fourth  row 
like  a  man  in  a  dream.  Then  he  gripped  Jarvis's 
arm.  "Look!"  he  cried.  "Down  there  with 
Madame  Rosalie." 

"What 's  the  matter*?  You  're  such  an  excit 
able  cuss,  Kenwick." 

"That  fellow  who's  with  her.  Look!  Jar  vis, 
that's  the  man!" 

"What  man?" 

"The  man  we  've  been  talking  about — my 
Missing  Link." 

Together  they  leaned  over  the  balcony  and 
scrutinized,  with  the  intent  gaze  of  a  pair  of 
detectives,  the  couple  in  the  fourth  row  right. 
It  may  have  been  coincidence,  or  it  may  have 
been  that  species  of  visual  hypnotism  known 
to  us  all,  which  suddenly  impelled  Madame 
Rosalie's  escort  to  turn  in  his  seat.  His  eyes 
swept  the  house  with  a  casual  glance,  then  lifted 
to  the  balcony.  Slowly  they  surveyed  the  arc  of 
faces  above  the  lights.  The  two  men  leaning 
toward  him  did  not  move.  In  another  instant  he 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  167 

had  found  them,  and  for  a  full  minute  he  and 
Roger  Kenwick  held  each  other.  And  then  the 
theater  went  black  as  the  curtain  rose  on  the  last 
act. 

Just  before  it  was  over  Kenwick  bade  his  com 
panion  a  hurried  farewell.  "I  'm  going  down  and 
introduce  myself  to  that  fellow.  I  know  I  've 
seen  him  before  somewhere,  and  he  may  be  able 
to  give  me  my  clue.  You  don't  mind  if  I  break 
away?  I  want  to  catch  him  before  he  is  lost  in 
the  crowd/' 

But  this  hope  was  thwarted.  For  hurrying 
down  the  aisle  in  that  moment  before  the  rush  of 
exit,  while  the  audience  was  finding  its  wraps,  he 
found  two  seats  in  the  fourth  row  empty.  Slowly 
he  walked  back  to  the  St.  Germaine,  his  thoughts 
in  a  tumult.  Why  should  they  have  wanted  to 
leave  before  the  end  of  as  good  a  performance  as 
that?  Something  must  have  happened.  Could 
it  be  that  they  had  wanted  to  escape  him?  At 
such  long  range  it  hadn't  been  possible  for  him 
to  determine  whether  or  not  there  was  a  flash  of 
recognition  in  the  other  man's  eyes,  but  his  mys 
terious  disappearance  was  haunting.  On  the 
following  morning,  before  going  to  the  "Clarion" 
office  he  took  a  car  out  to  Fillmore  Street. 

At  Madame  Rosalie's  shabby  home  a  man  in 


168  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

shirt  sleeves  opened  the  door.  "Oh,  she  don't 
live  here  any  more,"  he  explained  to  the  caller. 
"She  moved  a  week  ago.  I  'm  getthV  the  place 
ready  for  a  new  tenant." 

"Do  you  know  where  she  went?" 

The  man  grinned.  "Them  mediums  don't  gen 
erally  leave  no  forwardin'  address.  Their  motto 
is  'Keep  MovinV  I  will  say,  though,  that  the 
Rosalie  woman  was  a  perfect  lady  and  paid  her 
rent  regular  in  advance." 

Kenwick  walked  away,  turning  this  latest  de 
velopment  slowly  in  his  mind,  looking  at  it  from 
tvery  angle.  At  his  office  he  worked  mechani 
cally,  scarcely  conscious  of  what  he  wrote.  He 
was  in  two  minds  now  about  the  Eastern  trip. 
Perhaps  it  would  be  better  to  take  Jarvis's  advice 
and  let  things  have  their  head  a  bit  longer.  And 
he  was  certain  of  some  of  his  facts  now.  The  face 
of  the  man  in  the  fourth  row  had  been  like  the 
flash  of  a  torch  at  midnight.  For  most  of  the 
night  he  had  been  awake,  going  back  over  the 
painful  trail  of  the  past,  fitting  some  of  its  pre 
viously  incomprehensible  details  into  their  places. 
What  a  curious  mosaic  his  life  had  been !  What 
contrasts  of  light  and  shade!  But  as  for  going 
back  to  Mont-Mer The  idea  made  him 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  169 

shudder.  No,  that  was  one  thing  he  would  not 
do.  It  would  be  like  courting  the  return  of  a 
nightmare. 

At  four  o'clock  he  left  the  office  and  went  to 
keep  an  appointment  with  Dr.  Gregson  Bennet 
in  the  Physicians'  Building.  Dr.  Bennet  be 
longed  to  that  class  of  specialists  who  designate 
their  business  quarters  in  plural  terms.  His 
offices  comprised  a  suite  of  four  rooms.  The  sign 
on  the  door  of  the  first  one  invited  the  caller  to 
enter,  unheralded.  Complying  with  this  injunc 
tion,  Kenwick  found  himself  in  a  well-lighted 
chamber  containing  a  massive  collection  of  light- 
green  upholstery  and  an  assortment  of  foreign- 
looking  pictures  artfully  selected  to  convey  the 
impression  that  their  owner  was  on  chummy  terms 
with  the  capitals  of  Europe. 

As  the  door  closed  automatically  behind  him,  a 
white-uniformed  figure  appeared,  like  a  perfectly 
trained  cuckoo,  from  the  adjoining  room  and  an 
nounced  in  level  tones,  "The-doctor-will-see-you- 
in-just-a-minute."  Kenwick  accepted  this  as 
surance  with  the  grave  credulity  that  one  fiction- 
maker  accords  another.  He  glanced  at  the  five 
other  patients  already  awaiting  their  turns  and 
picked  up  a  magazine. 


170  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

By  four- thirty  he  had  read  the  jokes  in  the 
back  of  "Anybody's  Magazine"  for  the  preceding 
six  months.  No  physician  in  reputable  standing 
ever  removes  old  numbers  of  periodicals  from  his 
files.  For  what  better  testimony  can  he  offer  in 
support  of  his  claim  upon  a  long-established  prac 
tice?  As  Kenwick  read,  he  was  aware  that 
his  companions  were  being  summoned  one  by  one 
to  embark  upon  that  mysterious  journey  from 
whose  bourne  no  traveler  returns,  departure  hav 
ing  been  arranged  for  around  some  obscure  corner, 
to  prevent  exchange  between  arriving  and  re 
treating  patient  of  a  "Look!  Stop!  Listen!" 
signal. 

By  five  o'clock  only  one  other  patient  besides 
himself  remained;  a  little  woman  in  shiny  serge 
suit  and  passee  summer  hat.  Kenwick  put  down 
his  magazine  with  a  long-drawn  sigh,  and  she 
smiled  in  patient  sympathy.  "Gets  pretty  tire 
some  waitin',  doesn't  it*?"  she  ventured. 

His  quick  eyes  took  in  her  shabby  suit  and  the 
knotted  ungloved  hands.  She  was  probably  the 
mother  of  a  growing  family,  he  reflected,  and 
would  not  get  home  in  time  now  to  prepare 
dinner.  His  easy  sympathy  flared  into  words. 

"It  Js  an  outrage  to  keep  people  waiting  like 
this  when  they  have  an  appointment  for  a  definite 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  171 

hour.  They  tell  me  Bennet  's  a  nerve  specialist, 
and  I  believe  it." 

She  smiled  wanly,  but  there  was  an  eager  cham 
pionship  in  her  response.  "Oh,  but  he  Js  won 
derful  !  When  he  once  begins  to  talk  to  you,  you 
forget  all  about  bein'  mad  at  him.  Seems  like  he 
sees  right  through  your  head  to  tell  what 's  the 
matter  with  you." 

The  white  uniform  appeared  and  pronounced 
a  name:  "Mr.  Kenwick."  He  rose  and  followed 
her  through  the  door.  The  second  room  was  like 
the  first,  minus  reading-matter  and  plus  wall- 
charts.  Here  he  sat,  gazing  at  the  fire-escapes  on 
the  opposite  building,  while  the  white  uniform 
made  a  not  completely  satisfying  attempt  to  col 
lect  family  statistics.  And  then,  at  last,  the  door 
of  the  third  room  opened  and  Dr.  Bennet  himself 
emerged.  He  was  enveloped  in  a  heavy  white 
apron  that  recalled  to  Kenwick' s  mind  the  pic 
tures  he  had  seen  in  the  agricultural  magazines 
featuring  model  dairying. 

But  if  the  specialist  had  been  slow  to  admit 
him,  he  was  equally  reluctant  to  let  him  go. 
When  he  had  finished  his  examination,  Kenwick 
stood  beside  the  couch  in  the  fourth  and  last 
room  pulling  on  his  coat.  "Then  you  think  I  'm 
in  pretty  good  condition,  doctor?"  Through  the 


172  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

half -open  door  he  could  see  the  white  uniform 
hovering,  like  an  emblem  of  peace,  above  a 
steaming  basin  of  warlike  instruments. 

"I  should  say,"  the  physician  told  him  slowly, 
"that  you  are  absolutely  sound.  Your  nerves  are 
a  bit  too  highly  charged,  but  I  imagine  that  is 
more  a  matter  of  temperament  than  overstrain." 

"Is  that  all?' 

"No,  that  is  n't  all.  The  history  of  your  case, 
as  you  have  given  it  to  me,  is  a  most  interesting 
one.  And  you  were  right  to  let  me  make  the 
examination  and  form  my  own  conclusions  before 
telling  me  anything  about  your  history.  I  wish 
it  were  possible  for  you  to  recall  the  name  of  the 
physician  who  handled  your  case  in  France.  I  'd 
like  to  get  the  scientific  beginning  of  the  story. 
Without  it  I  can  only  make  a  guess,  and  guessing 
is  not  satisfactory.  But  I  think  that  in  his  place 
I  should  have  taken  the  chance  and  operated. 
However,  you  can't  judge;  he  may  not  have  had 
the  proper  equipment.  I  wish  you  would  come 
around  next  Saturday  when  the  office  is  closed, 
and  let  me  make  some  X-ray  plates.  I  'd  like 
to  display  them  at  the  medical  convention  in 
April." 

"And  what  do  you  advise  me  to  do  for  my — 
my  mental  health4?" 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  173 

"Forget  your  mental  health.  Take  some  regu 
lar  out-of-door  exercise  and  mix  with  your 
friends.  I  can't  give  you  any  better  prescription 
than  that.  If  it  were  something  done  up  in  pink 
paper  you  'd  be  more  apt  to  take  it,  I  know." 

Kenwick  walked  back  through  the  darkening 
streets  with  a  feeling  of  exultation.  The  pendu 
lum  of  his  despair  was  swinging  backward  to  a 
height  only  attained  by  those  who  can  plumb  the 
depths  of  wretchedness.  For  the  first  time  in  six 
weeks  he  felt  his  old  defiance  of  life.  And  re 
calling  the  pale  ghost  of  a  former  prayer,  he  was 
ashamed  of  its  cowardice.  "That  never  hap 
pens  to  the  desperate  and  the  lonely,"  he  re 
minded  himself  grimly.  "The  best  security  on 
earth  for  a  prolonged  life  is  to  express  a  sincere 
desire  to  die.  After  that,  you  lead  a  charmed 
existence.  Houses  burn  to  the  ground  and  not 
one  inmate  escapes;  ships  go  down  with  every 
body  aboard;  pedestrians  are  run  over  by  cars 
and  shot  by  thugs,  but  none  of  these  things  come 
near  the  man  who  courts  them.  They  overtake 
those  whom  others  find  it  hard  to  spare,  those 
whose  lives  are  vivid  with  purpose." 

As  he  walked  back  to  the  hotel  he  found  him 
self  thinking  of  Marcreta  again.  Had  he  ever 
really  made  a  place  for  himself  in  her  life? 


174  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Whether  he  had  or  not,  he  knew  that  he  had 
never,  even  in  his  blackest  moments,  given  her 
up.  All  the  plans  for  his  future  centered  still 
about  her.  Well,  he  had  a  fight  before  him  now, 
and  not  until  he  won  it  would  he  make  himself 
known  at  the  house  on  Pine  Street. 

On  the  corner  a  newsboy  thrust  a  paper  under 
his  face.  He  waved  it  aside.  "I  can  read  all 
that  bunk  for  nothing,  sonny,"  he  told  him  cheer 
fully.  The  huge  head-lines  filled  him  with  a 
spiritual  nausea.  The  chronicle  of  the  day's 
tragedies  for  the  public  to  batten  upon!  Was 
there  never  to  be  an  end  to  America's  greed  for 
the  sensational? 

At  the  St.  Germaine  the  clerk  handed  him  a 
telephone  call.  It  was  from  Jarvis  and  urged 
him  to  call  him  up  immediately.  In  his  own 
room  Kenwick  complied  with  this  request.  The 
voice  of  the  Southerner  came  to  him,  sharply 
commanding,  over  the  wire.  "Can  you  come 
around  right  away?  I  want  to  talk  it  over  with 
you." 

"Talk  what  over?"  Kenwick's  voice  was  al 
most  defiant. 

"Why,  haven't  you  seen  it?  Well,  come 
around  anyway.  I  '11  be  here  for  the  next  hour." 

When  Kenwick  arrived  at  the  Hartshire  he 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  175 

found  the  photographer  sorting  over  a  pile  of 
films.  But  as  his  guest  entered,  he  swept  these 
into  a  pasteboard  box,  and  cleared  off  a  chair  for 
him.  "Where  have  you  been*?"  he  demanded. 
"I  called  you  at  the  hotel  and  the  'Clarion'  office 


twice." 


Kenwick  gave  him  a  brief  account  of  the  last 
two  hours.  Jarvis  grunted.  "Well,  I  don't  blame 
you  for  wanting  to  get  the  seal  of  scientific  ap 
proval  but — I  can't  believe  that  you  have  n't  read 
the  'Record'  yet.  And  you  a  newspaper  man!" 

He  fished  the  paper  out  from  under  a  stack  of 
developing-trays  and  searched  the  columns  of  the 
second  page.  "Remember  what  I  suggested  to 
you  last  night,  that  you  let  things  take  their  own 
course  for  a  while?  Well,  it  seems  that  they  've 
been  taking  them  in  rather  a  headlong  fashion." 
He  creased  back  the  page  and  handed  the  paper 
to  Kenwick.  "Read  that  and  see  if  it  does  n't 
give  you  something  of  a  jolt." 

He  took  the  paper.  The  head-lines  at  the  top 
of  the  third  page  riveted  themselves  upon  his 
brain. 


176  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

RELATIVE  SEEKS  MISSING  MAN 

Body  of   Roger   Kenwick   to   Be   Exhumed   at 
Mont-Mer 

The  body  of  Roger  Kenwick,  son  of  the  late  Charles 
Kenwick,  of  New  York,  who  died  at  Rest  Hollow  last 
November,  is  to  be  exhumed  for  examination  on  the 
demand  of  Mrs.  Hilda  Fanwell,  of  Reno,  Nevada.  Mrs. 
Fanwell,  a  widow,  arrived  from  her  home  last  week  in 
search  of  her  brother,  Ralph  Regan,  who  has  been  a 
resident  of  Mont-Mer  for  the  last  two  years.  A  letter 
received  from  him  in  the  early  part  of  November  indi 
cated,  according  to  the  sister's  statement,  that  he  was  in 
failing  health.  Being  unable  to  come  to  him  then,  owing 
to  the  illness  of  her  husband,  Mrs.  Fanwell  wrote  several 
letters,  none  of  which  were  answered.  The  description 
of  her  brother,  which  she  furnished  the  police,  has  re 
sulted  in  a  demand  to  the  authorities  to  have  the  body  of 
Roger  Kenwick  exhumed. 

Kenwick  let  the  paper  slide  to  the  table.  "My 
Lord !"  he  murmured.  "Jarvis,  what  would  you 
do  about  it?" 

"Why  should  you  do  anything  about  it?  This 
Fanwell  woman  is  apparently  the  oldest  Gold 
Dust  twin.  Let  her  do  your  work." 

But  Kenwick's  eyes  were  still  fixed  upon  the 
paper.  Over  it  a  drop  of  acid  from  the  develop- 
ing-tray  was  eating  a  slow  passage.  "But  to  see 
my  name  tied  up  to  a  gruesome  thing  like 
that Why,  you  can't  imagine  how  it 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  177 

It  gives  me  the  feeling  that — that  I  've  just 
begun  on  this  thing.  And  I  thought  when  I  came 
in  here  that  I  had  all  the  cards  in  my  hands." 

He  got  up  from  the  table  slowly,  like  a  hos 
pital  patient  testing  his  strength  on  the  first  day 
out  of  bed.  And  Jarvis,  after  one  glance  at  his 
pale  face,  rose  too.  "You  Ve  got  nothing  to 

worry  about ,"  he  began.  But  Kenwick 

waved  the  soothing  aside  with  a  fierce  impatience. 

"Nothing  to  worry  about?"  he  cried  hotly. 
"Don't  offer  me  that  stuff,  Jarvis.  How  do  I 
know — how  can  I  ever  know  what  I  may  have 
done  during  those  ghastly  ten  months'?" 


. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

TT7HEN  Kenwick  entered  the  St.  Germaine 
T  T  on  the  evening  after  his  interview  with 
Jarvis,  a  man  rose  from  the  farther  corner  of  the 
lobby  and  came  toward  him.  "Kenwick!"  he 
cried,  and  held  out  his  hand.  "I  thought  you 
never  would  come.  I  've  been  waiting  here  an 
eternity."  It  was  Clinton  Morgan. 

When  the  first,  somewhat  incoherent  greetings 
were  over  and  the  two  men  sat  facing  each  other 
across  Kenwick's  untidy  writing-table,  a  moment 
of  embarrassed  silence  fell  between  them.  Then, 
in  a  desperate  attempt  to  start  the  conversation, 
"I  'm  afraid  I  Ve  kept  you  waiting  rather  a  long 
time,"  the  host  apologized. 

"You  have,"  his  caller  agreed.  "It's  been 
more  than  a  year,  hasn't  it?"  He  spoke  in  a 
cheerful,  matter-of-fact  tone  as  though  a  mere 
pleasure-trip  had  intervened  between  this  and 
their  last  encounter.  But  Kenwick  was  looking 
at  him  intently. 

"You  know — about  it  then?" 

"Yes,  we  know  all  about  it."    Clinton  Morgan 


178 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  179 

leaned  over  and  put  his  hand  affectionately  upon 
the  other  man's  shoulder.  "And,  by  George, 
Kenwick,  I  congratulate  you.  I  congratulate  you 
from  the  bottom  of  my  heart.  It  was  one  chance 
against  a  thousand  that  you  could  win  out.  It 's 
a  miracle !" 

Kenwick  was  scarcely  conscious  of  the  last 
sentences.  His  attention  had  stopped  short  at 
that  word  "we."  He  reached  down  and  picked 
a  burnt  match  from  the  carpet  as  he  asked  with  a 
pathetic  attempt  at  formal  courtesy,  "How  is 
your  sister4?" 

"Getting  well,  I  believe.     She  has  been 

Well,  this  case  of  yours  is  a  most  enthralling  one, 
Kenwick.  Anybody  would  be  interested,  but  par 
ticularly  any  one  who  has  known  you.  We  have 
been  following  it  with  great  interest." 

Kenwick  looked  at  him  incredulously.  "How 
could  you*?" 

The  caller  shifted  his  position  uneasily. 
"Well,  that  Js  rather  a  long  story.  And  Marcreta 
might  prefer  to  tell  you  part  of  it  herself.  And 
that  brings  me  to  my  errand.  I  came  here  to  ask 
you  up  to  the  house.  We  've  just  got  the  old 
place  fixed  over,  and," — he  glanced  at  his  watch, 
— "it's  not  nine  o'clock  yet.  If  you  have 'nt 
something  else  on  hand  that " 


i8o  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Kenwick  cut  in  almost  harshly.  "Are  you  sure 
that  your  sister  would  care  to  see  me?  That  she 
wouldn't  perhaps  be — well,  afraid  of  me*?" 

Morgan  laughed.  "Well,  I  '11  be  there,  you 
know,  if  you  should  get  violent  and  begin  throw 
ing  things  around." 

But  the  other  man's  face  did  not  relax.  His 
voice  came  low  and  strained  as  though  it  were 
being  let  out  cautiously  under  high  gear.  "You 
don't  understand.  Nobody  can,  I  suppose,  who 
hasn't  been  through  this  experience."  His  ner 
vous  hands  stiffened  upon  the  arms  of  the  chair. 
"I  tell  you,  Morgan,  it 's  easier  for  a  denizen  of 
the  underworld  to  live  down  her  reputation  and 
achieve  a  reputable  place  in  society  than  for  a 
man  or  woman  to  regain  the  confidence  of  the 

world  after  a  period  of Well,  I  may  as  well 

out  with  the  damned  word — insanity." 

"Don't  call  it  that,  Kenwick.  It  was  n't  that. 
In  the  trenches  you  got  a  blow  that  put  you  out 
of  commission.  But  you  were  simply  in  a  dazed 
condition;  mental  aberration  beginning  with 
melancholia.  You  were  never  violently  insane; 
never  dangerous  to  anybody  else." 

"How  do  you  know?  How  do  I  know?  I  've 
suffered  the  anguish  of  hell,  wondering  about  it. 
Somebody  may  have  been  killed  in  that  accident 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  181 

that  restored  me  to  life.  It  may  have  been  all 
my  fault.  I  don't  know.  I  've  spent  the  last 
month  trying  to  find  out  in  a  quiet  way.  I  sup 
pose  you  think  I  'm  a  coward  for  not  going  at  it 
more  directly."  He  looked  at  his  companion  with 
a  defiant  appeal  in  his  eyes.  "But  there  were 
reasons  why  I  did  n't  want  to  kick  up  a  lot  of 
notoriety  about  myself.  For  any  harm  that  ever 
came  to  man  or  woman  through  me,  I  'm  eager  to 
pay.  No  court  decision  would  have  to  make  me 
do  it;  no  court  decision  could  keep  me  from 
doing  it.  But  I  wanted  to  save  my  name  if  I 
could.  I  wanted  to  save  my  name  so  that  some 
time  it  might  be  fit " 

"I  know."  Clinton  Morgan  interrupted  has 
tily.  The  memory  of  that  traitorous  bit  of  paper 
which  he  had  discovered  in  the  gold  and  ivory 
book  came  back  to  him  and  brought  a  guilty  flush 
to  his  cheeks.  Whether  he  would  or  no,  he 
seemed  to  hold  in  his  own  hands  all  the  threads 
of  this  tragic  romance.  A  line  of  Marcreta's  lyric 
drifted  through  his  brain: 

Whence  thy  uneasy  spirit  may  depart? 
How  well  that  word  had  been  chosen  to  describe 
and  conceal  the  living  death  which  this  man  had 
suffered ! 

"You  see,"  Kenwick  went  on,  "I  'm  the  spirit- 


182  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

ual  counterpart  of  the  Man  Without  a  Country. 
I  don't  belong  anywhere.  And,  more  than  that, 
I  'm  a  charge  on  the  public  conscience.  Every 
body  who  knows  about  my  period  of — of  incom- 
petency  belongs  to  an  unofficial  vigilance  com 
mittee,  whose  duty  it  is  to  warn  society  against 


me." 


Clinton  groped  for  a  reply,  but  words  would 
not  come.  And  the  fact  that  there  was  no  bit 
terness  in  the  other  man's  voice,  but  only  the 
level  monotony  which  is  achieved  by  long  sup 
pression,  made  it  infinitely  pathetic. 

"If  it  suited  your  whim  to  do  so,"  Ken  wick 
continued,  "you  might  reverse  the  usual  order  of 
dining;  begin  with  pie  and  end  with  soup.  And 
the  public  would  regard  it  either  as  a  new  cure  for 
dyspepsia  or  an  eccentricity  of  genius.  But  if  I 
should  try  it,  somebody  would  immediately  sug 
gest  that  I  should  n't  be  allowed  at  large.  It 's 
the  irony  of  fate  that  I,  who  have  always  had  a 
contempt  for  the  trivial  conventions  of  life  (such 
a  contempt  that  my  sister-in-law  never  quite 
trusted  me  in  polite  society),  should  now  be  in  a 
cowering  bondage  to  them.  I  live  all  my  days  in 
a  horror  of  doing  something  that  might  appear 
erratic.  And  I  spend  the  nights  going  back  over 
every  inch  of  the  road  to  see  if  I  have.  Why 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  183 

don't  the  adherents  of  the  fire-and-brimstone 
theory  picture  hell  as  a  place  where  we  can  never 
act  on  impulse?  As  a  place  which  dooms  us 
forever  to  a  hideous  self-consciousness?" 

Clinton  Morgan  spoke  with  a  sort  of  angry 
championship.  "You  've  had  tough  luck,  my 
boy,  the  toughest  kind  of  luck.  But  you  've 
come  out  of  it  all  right.  By  George,  you  can 
show  the  world  now  that  you  've  come  out  on 
top." 

"I  haven't  come  out;  that's  just  the  trouble. 
I  '11  never  be  out  of  the  woods  until  I  've  ac 
counted  for  them.  Did  you  read  last  night's 
paper,  Morgan?" 

"Yes.  That 's  one  thing  that  brought  me  here. 
Let  me  tell  you  something,  Kenwick.  Until 
about  a  week  ago  we  thought  you  were  dead. 
And  we  were  relieved,  for  we  felt  that  it  was  a 
happy  release  for  you;  your  only  way  out.  And 
then  one  day,  not  long  ago,  we  got  a  clue."  He 
still  clung  to  the  plural  pronoun.  "We  fell  over 
a  clue,  you  might  say,  which  aroused  our  sus 
picions — and  we  followed  it  down." 

"You  followed  it  down!"  Kenwick  cried. 
"You  cared  enough  about  it  for  that?" 

His  friend's  reply  came  through  guarded  lips. 
"You  have  suffered  horribly  during  these  past 


184  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

months,"  he  said.  "But  you  are  not  the  only  one 
who  has  suffered." 

Kenwick  glanced  at  him  sharply.  Then  he 
seemed  to  sense  the  delicacy  of  the  other  man's 
position.  "It 's  just  this,"  Kenwick  explained 
after  a  moment  of  silence.  "Since  this — this 
thing  fell  on  me,  I  instinctively  divide  all  people 
into  two  classes;  those  who  knew  me  before  it 
happened,  and  those  who  have  only  known  me 
since.  With  the  second  group  I  'm  always  won 
dering  if  they  are  still  unsuspecting:  with  the 
first,  I  'm  wondering  if  they  will  ever  be  con 
vinced.  But  go  on  with  your  story.  What  did 
you  do  about  the  clue*?" 

"I  '11  tell  you  about  that  later.  It 's  enough  to 
say  right  now  that  Richard  Glover " 

"Glover!"  The  word  seemed  to  explode  from 
Kenwick's  lips.  He  leaped  to  his  feet.  "That 's 
the  name !"  he  cried.  "That 's  the  name  that 
I  've  been  groping  after  for  two  days.  Sometimes 
I  almost  had  it  and  then  it  would  escape  me.  I 
had  an  idea  fixed  in  my  mind  somehow  that  it 
began  with  a  'B.'  Why,  I  saw  that  fellow  at 
the  theater  the  other  night,  Morgan.  It  was  a 
most  curious  thing,  for  as  soon  as  my  eyes  lighted 
on  him  the  vacuum  in  my  mind  was  suddenly 
filled.  I  remember  traveling  across  the  conti- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  185 

nent  with  him.  I  remember  my  brother  Everett 
introducing  me  to  him  one  day  at  home  before  I 
came  West  this  last  time.  That's  all  I  do  re 
member  about  him,  but  it  sort  of  connects  things 
in  my  brain.  I  wanted  to  talk  to  him  the  other 
night  and  see  if  he  could  n't  help  me  clear  things 
up,  but  when  I  got  down  to  his  seat,  he  was  gone. 
I  don't  know  whether  he  had  recognized  me  too 
or  not.  But  even  so,  I  can't  account  for  his 
wanting  to  avoid  me.  I  have  n't  got  anything 
against  him.  I  might  have  thought  the  whole 
thing  was  a  hallucination  (for  I  never  quite  trust 
my  own  senses  now),  but  I  had  a  reliable  witness. 
Now  what  I  want  to  know  is,  why  should  Glover 
be  afraid  to  meet  me?" 

"If  you  '11  come  up  to  the  house,"  Morgan  sug 
gested  again,  "we  may  be  able  to  straighten  out 
some  of  these  things." 

When  they  arrived,  a  few  minutes  later,  at  the 
Pine  Street  home,  Clinton  lingered  outside  fussing 
with  the  engine  of  his  car,  and  Roger  Kenwick 
went  alone  to  meet  Marcreta.  He  found  her  in 
the  fire-lighted  living-room  where  he  had  parted 
from  her,  and  she  came  to  greet  him  with  that 
slow  grace  that  he  knew  so  well,  and  that  seemed 
now  to  stop  the  beating  of  his  heart.  But  if  either 
of  them  had  expected  the  first  moments  of  reunion 


i86  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

to  melt  away  the  shadows  that  lay  between  them, 
they  were  disappointed.  For  the  fires  of  mem 
ory  burn  deep.  And  the  ghastly  suffering  with 
which  the  two  years  of  separation  had  been 
freighted  had  left  marks  that  were  not  to  be  oblit 
erated  by  those  words  of  carefully  casual  wel 
come.  In  spite  of  their  efforts  at  commonplace 
dialogue,  they  spoke  to  each  other  in  the  subdued 
voices  of  those  who  converse  in  the  presence  of 
death.  By  tacit  consent  they  avoided,  during  the 
first  half-hour,  all  mention  of  the  tragedy  which 
had  separated  them. 

"We  've  just  had  the  house  done  over,"  Mar- 
creta  was  saying  as  her  brother  entered.  "During 
the  war  it  was  a  sanitarium,  and  although  it  has 
all  been  retinted  and  there  are  new  hangings 
everywhere,  Clinton  says  it  still  smells  of  anes 
thetics.  I  tell  him  it  's  only  his  imagination.  Do 
you  get  any  odor  of  ether'?" 

"No,"  Kenwick  answered. 

He  found  talking  horribly  difficult.  This 
woman,  for  whom  his  soul  had  yearned,  seemed 
now  to  be  looking  at  him  from  across  a  deep 
chasm.  Between  them  stretched  the  bramble- 
bush;  a  tangle  of  underbrush;  stark  sycamore- 
trees  that  rattled  hideously  in  the  winter  wind; 
uprooted  madrone  bushes  stretching  distorted 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  187 

claws  heavenward  in  a  mute  appeal  for  vengeance. 
And  insistently  now  the  question  beat  against 
his  brain — had  he  ever  succeeded  in  crossing  that 
ravine?  Would  he  ever  really  succeed  in  crossing 
it?  With  the  clutch  of  desperation  he  clung  to 
the  verdict  of  Dr.  Gregson  Bennet,  as  he  had 
once  clung  for  support  to  those  grim,  high-backed 
chairs  at  Rest  Hollow.  He  recalled  having  once 
read  the  story  of  an  ex-convict  coming  home  after 
his  release  from  the  penitentiary  to  meet  that 
most  crucial  of  all  punishments;  the  eyes  of  the 
woman  that  he  loved.  To  his  supersensitive  soul, 
the  stigma  attached  to  him  was  something  that 
was  worse  than  crime;  a  thing  that  branded  deeper 
and  more  indelibly.  That  it  had  come  to  him  in 
the  discharge  of  duty  weighed  not  a  jot  on  his 
account-sheet.  He  told  himself  that  it  had  been 
a  judgment.  He  had  always  been  a  worshiper 
of  intellect.  It  had  seemed  to  him  the  one  en 
during  possession.  And  now  it  had  proved  itself 
even  more  ephemeral  than  physical  health.  As 
his  eyes  rested  upon  her,  unconscious  of  their  own 
sadness,  he  knew  all  at  once  that  Marcreta 
understood  and  was  trying  to  make  it  easy  for 
him. 

"The  only  way  to  make  this  easy  for  me,"  he 
heard  himself  saying  suddenly,  "is  to  drag  it  out 


i88  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

into  the  light.    As  long  as  the  past  lies  shrouded 
between  us,  we  will  never  be  able  to  forget  it." 

It  was  eleven  o'clock  when  Kenwick  went  down 
the  steps  of  the  Morgan  home.  He  refused  Clin 
ton's  invitation  to  ride  back  in  the  car.  For  he 
wanted  to  walk,  to  walk  on  and  on  forever  in  the 
glorious  starlight.  There  were  no  stars.  A  gray 
fog  had  rolled  in  from  the  bay  and  spread  itself 
like  a  huge  blotter  across  the  heavens.  But  he 
was  unaware  of  it.  Even  the  street  lights,  shin 
ing  dimly  as  through  frosted  glass,  seemed  to  shed 
across  his  path  a  supernatural  radiance.  For  al 
though  no  word  of  love  had  passed  between  him 
and  Marcreta  Morgan,  he  had  come  away  from 
that  visit  with  a  wild  happiness  surging  in  his 
heart.  There  had  been  no  effort  to  reestablish  life 
upon  its  old  basis.  Marcreta,  with  what  seemed 
to  him  an  almost  superhuman  tact,  had  di 
vined  the  ghastly  futility  of  such  an  endeavor. 
And  instead  she  had  conveyed  to  him,  by  some  in 
describable  method  of  her  own,  the  assurance  that 
she  would  welcome,  with  unquestioning  faith, 
the  opening  of  a  new  and  happier  era.  As  he  had 
sat  there  in  the  comfort  of  that  living-room, 
where  on  a  night,  not  long  ago,  he  had  caught  a 
glint  of  a  departed  glory,  desire  and  something 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  189 

finer  had  struggled  for  supremacy  in  his  soul. 
But  courageous  self-analysis  had  driven  home  to 
him  the  realization  that  he  had  Marcreta  Morgan 
at  a  cruel  disadvantage.  Whether  he  would 
or  no,  he  had  come  back  to  her  clothed  in  the 
appealing  garments  of  tragedy.  He  was  a  pen 
sioner  on  her  sympathy,  and  in  her  eagerness  to 
restore  to  him  his  lost  heritage,  she  had  uncon 
sciously  disarmed  herself.  The  temptation  to 
cherish  and  set  a  jealous  guard  upon  such  an  ad 
vantage  has  overpowered  men  and  women  in 
numerable.  Kenwick  sensed  the  treacherous 
sweetness  of  it  flooding  his  heart  like  the  seductive 
fragrance  of  some  rare  perfume,  and  then  in  a 
sudden  fury  he  tore  himself  free  of  it. 

"By  God!  I  have  n't  got  as  deep  in  as  that!" 
he  muttered,  and  was  unconscious  that  he  said  the 
words  aloud.  "I  have  n't  sunk  so  deep  that  I  'd 
pull  myself  up  that  way!"  He  buttoned  his 
overcoat  about  him  conscious  for  the  first  time  of 
the  chill  breeze.  Not  yet,  he  reminded  himself 
sharply,  not  yet  did  he  have  the  right  to  conquer. 

As  he  took  the  intersecting  street  to  cut  the 
steep  down-hill  slope  to  the  hotel,  he  heard  the 
echo  of  footsteps  behind  him.  He  quickened 
his  gait,  impatient  of  any  distracting  element,  and 


190  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

was  instantly  aware  that  the  other  footsteps  had 
quickened  theirs.  For  half  a  block  he  walked  at 
a  round  pace.  Then  he  stopped  short  and  waited 
for  the  other  pedestrian  to  overtake  him.  A  thick 
set  man  in  a  black  overcoat  passed  him,  slowed 
down  to  a  creeping  walk,  and  under  the  feeble 
light  of  the  corner  street-lamp  came  to  a  halt. 
Kenwick  glanced  at  him  sharply,  but  the  man  was 
a  stranger  to  him.  He  passed  on  unaccosted,  but 
as  he  was  stepping  from  the  curb  the  stranger 
loomed  up  suddenly  behind  him.  "Stop!"  he 
commanded. 

Kenwick  turned.  A  heavy  hand  was  laid  upon 
his  arm.  He  stood  waiting,  under  the  gleam  of 
the  bleary  light,  detained  more  by  curiosity  than 
by  the  grip  upon  his  arm.  From  the  burly  figure 
came  a  burly  voice.  "You  are  Roger  Kenwick." 

It  was  not  a  question,  but  the  other  man  gave  it 
sharp-voiced  response.  "Yes.  What  is  it  to 
you?' 

"A  good  deal  to  me.  I  Ve  been  waiting  for 
you.  Some  people  would  n't  have  waited,  but 
I  'm  a  gentleman  and  I  let  you  have  your  visit 
out  with  the  lady.  We  '11  take,  the  rest  of  the 
walk  together.  Beastly  night,  isn't  it*?" 

Kenwick  did  not  move,  and  his  voice  was  more 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  191 

astonished  than  resentful.  "I  think  you  've  made 
a  mistake  in  your  man.  You  say  you  have  been 
waiting  for  me?" 

The  burly  man  began  to  walk  slowly  away  and 
Kenwick  fell  into  step  beside  him.  "Ye-a,  I  Ve 
been  waiting  for  you.  And  even  if  I  had  n't  been, 
I  might  have  got  suspicious  a  minute  or  so  ago. 
Let  me  give  you  a  tip  for  your  own  good;  don't 
talk  to  yourself  in  public.  It 's  a  bad  habit  for 
anybody  in  your  line  of  trade." 

Kenwick  stopped  short.  "What  do  you 
mean?" 

"I  mean,  Mr.  Kenwick,  that  you  are  under 


arrest." 


The  slanting  pavement  seemed  suddenly  to  be 
moving  of  its  own  accord  and  Kenwick  felt  it 
carrying  him  along  as  though  he  were  on  an  esca 
lator.  Then  he  heard  himself  ask  dully,  "What 
for?" 

The  officer  looked  bored.  But  he  stood  there 
waiting  in  grim  patience  for  his  companion  to  re 
gain  the  power  of  locomotion.  "I  asked  you  what 
for?"  Kenwick  repeated  sharply.  "You  've  made 
a  mistake,  but  you  've  got  to  answer  that  ques 
tion.  If  I  'm  going  to  be  hauled  into  jail,  the 
law  gives  me  the  right  to  know  why." 

"Oh,    cut    it    out!"    the    other    admonished. 


1Q2  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"You  're  surprised  all  right;  they  always  are.  But 
I  '11  say  this  for  you,  Mr.  Ken  wick,  there  's  noth 
ing  amateurish  about  your  work.  Plans  all  laid 
to  make  a  quiet  getaway  East,  but  no  dodging 
around  cheap  lodging-houses  for  yours.  Busi 
ness  as  usual,  and  friends  kept  happy  and  unsus 
pecting;  everything  strictly  on  the  level.  You 
know  as  well  as  I  do  why  I  'm  on  your  track. 
You  're  wanted  for  murder — for  the  murder  of 
Ralph  Regan." 


CHAPTER  XV 

IN  the  twelve  hours  that  intervened  between 
Roger  Kenwick's  arrest  and  his  transference 
to  the  authorities  at  Mont-Mer,  he  was  not  al 
lowed  to  see  any  one.  As  rigid  a  watch  was  kept 
beside  his  cell  as  though  he  were  a  hardened  crim 
inal  who  had  on  previous  occasions  escaped  the 
clutches  of  justice.  Even  reporters  were  denied 
admittance,  but  he  was  permitted,  in  courtesy 
to  his  former  position  as  journalist,  to  read  the 
papers.  In  these  he  found,  spread  large  upon  the 
front  pages,  highly  colored  stories  concerning  his 
manceuvers  and  final  capture.  Only  the  "Clar 
ion's"  story  was  conservative  and  hinted  at  a 
colossal  mistake  which  would  lead  later  to  more 
sensational  developments. 

When  he  left  San  Francisco,  heavily  hand 
cuffed,  a  crowd  followed  to  the  depot.  The  trip 
down  the  coast  was  uneventful,  and  he  sat  staring 
out  of  the  window,  recalling  his  former  ride 
through  that  same  country  when  the  pruners  had 
waved  their  shears  to  him  in  a  sort  of  voiceless 
Godspeed.  There  were  no  pruners  visible  from 

193 


194  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

the  car-window  now,  and  the  stark  stretches  of 
orchard  looked  bleak  and  desolate.  The  bare, 
tangled  branches  of  the  roadside  poplars  showed 
against  the  dull  January  sky  like  intricate  de 
signs  of  lace  work.  They  seemed  to  Ken  wick  to 
have  lost  the  comforting  warmth  of  their  leaves 
just  when  they  needed  them  most. 

It  was  almost  dusk  when  the  train  drew  into 
Mont-Mer,  and  here  another  crowd  was  waiting. 
The  engine  appeared  to  plow  its  way  through 
them.  Never  had  the  quiet  little  city  been  so 
stirred.  Never  in  all  its  decorous  history  had  the 
white  spot-light  of  sensationalism  played  upon 
it.  It  knew  that  its  name  was  featured  in  every 
newspaper  of  the  country. 

And  Kenwick  found  the  Mont-Mer  papers  even 
more  lavish  in  descriptive  detail  than  those  of  the 
city  had  been.  There  was  a  picture  of  the  mur 
dered  man  and  one  of  himself  spread  upon  the 
front  page  of  the  evening  sheet,  and  below,  a  cut 
of  Rest  Hollow,  with  the  inevitable  black  cross 
marking  the  spot  under  the  dining-room  window 
where  the  body  of  Ralph  Regan  had  been  found. 
The  morning  daily  matched  this  with  a  picture 
of  the  handsome  Kenwick  home  in  New  York, 
and  an  account  of  the  death,  the  previous  spring, 
of  Everett  Kenwick  and  his  wife,  victims  of  in- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  195 

fluenza.  As  he  read,  Kenwick  reflected  that  Rich 
ard  Glover  must  have  been  very  busy,  very  busy 
indeed  since  the  night  that  they  had  encountered 
each  other  at  the  theater. 

And  outside  the  county  jail  the  city  buzzed 
with  comment  and  speculation.  Mont-Mer  real 
estate  men  were  elated  over  this  unexpected 
scandal  in  high  society  which  had  resulted  in 
putting  their  town  "on  the  map."  Better  a  grue 
some  publicity,  they  told  each  other,  than  no  pub 
licity  at  all.  Tourists  from  Los  Angeles  and  the 
near-by  towns  motored  up  during  the  week-end 
and  made  futile  attempts  to  gain  access  to  Rest 
Hollow.  The  old  conservative  residents  of  the 
aristocratic  little  city  were  horrified,  and  the 
colony  of  Eastern  capitalists,  who  made  up  a 
large  part  of  the  suburban  population,  were  hotly 
resentful  of  the  hideous  notoriety  which  had  in 
vaded  their  retreat  by  the  sea.  The  two  country 
estates  that  bordered  Rest  Hollow  were  put  on 
the  market  at  what  the  local  realty  dealers  adver 
tised  as  "spectacular  bargains." 

After  the  body  of  Ralph  Regan  had  been  ex 
humed  and  identified  by  the  grief-stricken  little 
woman  who  was  his  sister,  the  links  of  the  chain 
which  incriminated  Kenwick  seemed  to  fall  of 
their  own  volition  into  place.  He  reviewed  them 


196  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

himself,  sitting  alone  in  Mont-Mer's  bleak  little 
jail. 

There  would  be  first  the  testimony  of  the  coro 
ner  who  would  describe  the  gunshot  wound. 
And  then  the  evidence  that  he,  Kenwick,  had  been 
armed  on  that  fatal  night.  The  woman,  or  who 
ever  it  was  that  occupied  the  right  wing  of  the 
house,  would  narrate  in  detail  all  that  he  had 
said  about  being  a  good  shot  and  would  doubtless 
follow  this  with  the  testimony  that  he  was  ob 
viously  looking  for  trouble.  The  revolver,  which 
he  had  left  on  the  table  in  the  den,  would  add 
its  mute  confirmation  of  these  assertions.  And 
his  own  mode  of  departure  from  that  house,  under 
such  circumstances,  was  sufficient  in  itself  to  send 
him  to  the  electric  chair  without  any  further  tes 
timony.  Glover  would  be,  of  course,  the  star 
witness  for  the  State,  and  against  his  glib  and 
convincing  story  would  be  pitted  the  word  of  a 
man  known  to  have  been  of  an  unsound  state  of 
mind  and  never  proved  to  have  recovered  from  it. 
It  was  this  last  evidence,  he  knew,  that  would 
acquit  him.  With  the  brand  of  Cain  upon  his 
forehead  he  would  be  set  free.  The  ghastly  no 
toriety  which  he  had  striven,  with  the  difficult 
patience  of  the  impatient  temperament,  to  avoid, 
had  struck  him  with  the  force  of  a  bomb  and 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  197 

blown  him  skyward  to  be  the  cynosure  of  every 
eye.  Never  while  the  world  stood  could  he  ask 
Marcreta  Morgan  to  take  the  name  of  Kenwick. 
Acquittal  on  any  terms  was  all  that  most  men 
would  have  asked  of  fate.  But  Kenwick  was 
made  of  finer  stuff.  And  so  far  as  his  future 
was  concerned,  he  was  already  tried,  convicted, 
and  sentenced. 

A  week  intervened  between  his  arrival  at  Mont- 
Mer  and  the  day  set  for  the  trial.  During  that 
time  he  knew  himself  to  be  under  the  most  relent 
less  surveillance.  By  day  and  by  night  his  every 
act  was  watched.  With  his  food  they  brought  him 
neither  knife  nor  fork.  On  the  second  day  of 
this  startling  omission  he  smiled  grimly  at  the  at 
tendant.  "You  can  tell  the  jailer,"  he  said,  "that 
he  need  n't  be  worried  about  me  to  that  extent. 
You  see,  I  've  worn  my  country's  uniform,  and 
that  spoils  a  man  for  taking  the  Dutch  route." 

The  stolid-faced  attendant  looked  at  him  with 
out  replying.  Kenwick  felt  a  sudden  pity  for 
him.  "I  suppose  he  thinks  I  'm  likely  to  get 
violent  and  begin  smashing  up  things  at  any  mo 
ment,"  he  reflected.  For  in  the  jailer's  eyes  was 
that  thing  for  which  he  had  been  on  the  watch 
for  almost  two  months.  He  pushed  away  his 
food  almost  untasted.  When  he  was  left  alone 


198  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

again  he  walked  over  to  the  heavily  barred  win 
dow  and  stood  looking  down  at  the  court-house 
garden.  Very  gently  he  shook  one  of  the  iron 
rods.  "For  almost  a  year,"  he  muttered.  "Barred 
in  for  almost  a  year;  and  the  world  has  no  in 
tention  of  ever  letting  me  forget  it." 

The  date-palms  in  the  grounds  below  swept  the 
wintry  air  with  long  graceful  plumes.  How  help 
less  they  were  in  the  driving  force  of  the  wind ! 
And  yet  they  were  moored  to  something,  securely 
rooted.  The  storm  might  buffet  but  would  not 
utterly  destroy  them.  Down  the  curving  path 
which  they  bordered  he  saw  a  man  approaching 
with  a  flat  leather  case  under  his  arm.  It  was 
Dayton,  the  young  attorney  whom  the  court  had 
appointed  for  his  defense.  Kenwick,  who  had 
taken  his  intellectual  measure  at  their  first  meet 
ing  the  day  before,  had  little  faith  in  his  legal 
ability.  But  he  liked  him;  liked  his  buoyant, 
unspoiled  personality.  And  Dayton  was  undis- 
guisedly  elated  over  this  sudden  opportunity  to 
try  his  mettle  in  so  conspicuous  a  case.  It  was 
the  chance  he  had  been  hoping  for  during  three 
years  of  commonplace  practice. 

As  the  prisoner  heard  his  step  in  the  upper 
corridor  he  turned  from  the  window.  Dayton 
closed  the  portal  behind  him  and  sat  down  on 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  199 

the  edge  of  the  narrow  cot.  Downstairs  he  had 
just  held  brief  parley  with  the  jailer.  "Has  n't 
Kenwick  got  any  family*?"  he  had  inquired. 

The  official  shook  his  head.  "As  I  understand 
it,  he  did  n't  have  anybody  but  a  brother,  and  he 
died  last  spring,  the  papers  said." 

"No  friends  either?" 

"Friends'?  Well,  he  wouldn't  be  likely  to 
have  any,  would  he — a  feller  that 's  been  crazy?" 

"It 's  cursed  luck!"  Dayton  had  told  him.  He 
was  still  young  enough  to  feel  resentful  of  life's 
contemptuous  injustices.  "And  he  's  only  twenty- 
five;  got  his  whole  life  before  him.  He  's  got  to 
have  his  chance.  He  's  got  to  have  a  fighting 
chance." 

As  he  looked  at  his  client  now,  he  was  careful  to 
keep  anything  like  compassion  out  of  his  eyes. 
He  removed  a  cracked  pitcher  full  of  purple 
asters  from  its  perilous  position  at  the  head  of  the 
bed  and  swept  his  glance  over  the  crude  table 
littered  with  envelopes  in  cream  and  pastel  shades. 
"Correspondence  still  growing?"  he  inquired 
genially. 

Kenwick  stacked  the  vari-colored  missives  into 
a  pile.  Most  of  them  had  been  accompanied  by 
flowers,  and  all  were  signed  by  society  women  of 
Mont-Mer.  A  few  bore  the  more  guarded  signa- 


200  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

ture  of  "A  Friend,"  or  "A  Sympathizer,"  with 
initials  underneath.  They  condoled,  they  ad 
monished,  they  even  made  cautious  love. 

"Can  you  fathom  it,  Dayton?"  the  prisoner 
asked,  weighing  the  correspondence  in  one  hand 
as  though  the  answer  to  the  riddle  lay  in  avoir 
dupois.  "These  women  think  I  'm  guilty  of  mur 
der.  They  all  seem  to  think  1 7m  guilty  as  hell ; 
and  yet  they  send  me  flowers,  and  love-letters." 
He  turned  his  back  contemptuously  upon  the 
purple  asters.  "It  comes  over  me  every  once  in 
a  while,  Dayton,  that  I  'm  not  the  only  person  in 
this  world  who  has  had  moments  of  mental  aber 
ration." 

The  other  man  reached  over,  took  up  the  stack 
of  envelopes,  and  examined  them  with  curious 
interest.  Here  and  there  he  recognized  a  coat  of 
arms  or  a  monogram.  "Going  to  answer  any  of 
them?"  he  queried. 

"Answer  them!" 

"Well,  most  of  them  seem  to  expect  a  reply. 
You  see,  you  really  can't  blame  them  very  much, 
either.  These  women  are  fed  up  on  life.  They 
come  out  here  every  winter  seeking  a  new  sensa 
tion." 

"And  I  am  a  new  sensation,  am  I?" 

"You  bet  you  are !    Why,  man,  you  're  nothing 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  201 

short  of  a  godsend.  And  most  of  these  people," 
he  swept  a  hand  over  the  coterie  represented  on 
the  table,  "are  from  New  York  themselves. 
They  're  not  writing  to  a  stranger  exactly.  They 
know  who  your  family  is — or  was.  They  know 
all  about  you." 

Kenwick's  lips  stiffened.  "Well,  they  cer 
tainly  have  that  advantage  over  me." 

"I  don't  mean  to  imply,  of  course,  that*  they  Ve 
been  investigating  your  personal  history,"  Dayton 
hastened  to  explain.  "But  Ken  wick  is  not  an  in 
conspicuous  name  in  the  East.  And  then  you  Ve 
been  in  the  service  and " 

"I  'm  glad  you  mentioned  that,"  the  prisoner 
cut  in.  "It  reminds  me  of  something  I  want  to 
say  to  you.  When  you  get  up  to  talk  in  court, 
don't  you  make  any  plea  for  me  on  the  grounds 
that  I  Ve  been  in  the  service.  That 's  one  thing 
I  won't  stand  for.  The  man  who  was  in  the  army 
is  a  different  man  from  the  alleged  murderer  of 
Ralph  Regan.  I  'm  not  going  to  have  his  record 
smeared  with  this  horrible  thing." 

Dayton  dropped  the  letters  to  the  table  as 
though  they  had  bitten  him.  "Why,  Mr.  Ken- 
wick  !  You  Ve  got  a  right  to  the  consideration 
that  would  naturally " 

"If  I  Ve  got  a  right  to  it,  I  Ve  got  a  right  to 


202  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

waive  it.  This  country  is  flooded  with  men  who 
expect  to  beat  their  way  all  through  life  on  the 
plea  that  they  've  been  in  the  service.  And 
there  's  nothing  so  despicable  on  God's  earth  as 
that.  I  use  my  uniform  to  fight  in,  not  to  hide  in. 
Get  me?' 

Dayton  was  obviously  crestfallen.  He  got  up 
from  the  hard  cot  and  stood  looking  at  his  client 
gravely."  Kenwick  gathered  up  the  pile  of  en 
velopes.  "Take  this  junk  out  of  here  when  you 
go,  please.  And  don't  let  them  send  in  any  more 
flowers.  They  can  save  those  for  the  funeral. 
But  I  'm  not  dead  yet." 

"You  may  be  very  soon,  though,  if  you  don't 
listen  to  sense,"  his  adviser  remarked  bluntly.  "I 
have  n't  wanted  to  get  you  worked  up  over  the 
case,  because  that 's  poor  policy  and  it  does  n't 
buy  us  anything.  But  it  strikes  me,  Mr.  Kenwick, 
that  you  don't  realize  what  a  very  serious  posi 
tion  you  are  in." 

The  ghost  of  a  smile  appeared  upon  the  prison 
er's  face.  It  was  a  terrible  little  smile,  and  he 
was  not  even  conscious  of  its  existence.  He  was 
only  conscious  that  every  nerve  in  his  body  ached 
with  weariness  and  that  he  felt  faint  from  want 
of  food.  Two  pictures  were  stamping  themselves 
alternately  upon  his  brain;  the  dim,  sinister  in- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  203 

terior  of  Rest  Hollow,  and  the  fire-lighted  room 
on  Pine  Street.  One  of  these  incessantly  erased 
and  superseded  the  other.  And  he  knew  that 
there  could  be  no  division  of  their  supremacy. 
Only  one  of  them  might  survive.  Day  and  night 
the  memory  of  them  racked  his  jaded  brain.  For 
the  humiliation  of  his  present  position,  not  the 
ultimate  outcome  of  the  trial,  burned  him  with 
a  consuming  flame. 

As  he  stood  now  at  the  barred  window,  he  was 
doing  that  thing  to  which,  ever  since  his  arrest,  all 
his  energies  had  been  directed.  Hour  by  hour, 
minute  by  minute,  he  was  welding  together  the 
joints  of  an  armor.  With  a  slow  but  ceaseless 
persistence  he  was  girding  himself  with  a  graven- 
faced  indifference  that  must  be  his  shield  against 
the  barrage  of  the  gaping,  curious  world.  And 
this  man,  standing  so  close  beside  him,  and  in 
reality  so  far  away  that  their  spirits  were  scarcely 
discernible  to  each  other  in  the  distance  was  tell 
ing  him  that  he  seemed  unaware  of  the  peril  of 
his  position.  That  wave  of  deafening  depression 
which  engulfs  the  human  soul  in  the  moments 
when  it  realizes  its  utter  loneliness  surged  over 
him  like  a  tidal  wave.  He  stood  looking  at  Day 
ton  and  wondering  what  manner  of  man  he  was. 

"I  don't  want  to  play  up  anything  now  that 


204  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

will  sound  like  dramatics,"  the  lawyer  went  on  in 
a  soothing  voice.  "But  we  've  got  to  face  this 
thing  as  it  is.  You  know  Glover,  don't  you*?" 

"No.  But  Glover  knows  me.  He  has  that 
immense  advantage.  And  he  is  using  it  to  the 
full.  He  has  been  fighting  a  man  who 's  got 
both  hands  tied  behind  him." 

Dayton  appeared  to  take  new  courage  from  this 
summary.  "Well,  I  see  you  've  got  a  line  on  his 
methods  anyway,  and  that  's  something.  That 
gives  us  our  starting-point.  And  besides  having 
both  hands  free,  he  5s  also  got  his  eyes  open. 
You  've  been  blindfolded  a  part  of  the  time.  He 
never  has." 

There  was  a  sound  of  a  key  grating  in  the  lock. 
The  dialogue  ended  abruptly  and  Kenwick  turned 
from  the  window.  On  the  threshold  was  a 
shabby,  faded-looking  little  woman  guarded  by 
the  relentless  sentry.  Kenwick  advanced  to  meet 
her,  apologizing  for  the  discomfort  of  the  backless 
chair  which  he  offered. 

"No,  I  don't  want  to  sit  down,  thanks,"  she 
told  him  hurriedly.  "I  'm  not  goin'  to  stay  but  a 
minute."  She  twisted  her  ungloved  hands  ner 
vously  together  under  a  scrawny  wool  scarf. 
"It 's  just  this,  Mr.  Kenwick;  I  asked  them  to  let 
me  come  just  to  tell  you  this " 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  205 

The  prisoner  stood  waiting.  The  realization 
came  to  him  that  she  was  afraid  of  him,  and  he 
tried  to  help  her  to  begin.  "You  are  Mrs.  Fan- 
well,  are  n't  you*?" 

"Yes.    But — you  don't  know  me,  do  you?" 

"No,  I  just  guessed  at  who  you  were."  His 
eyes  rested  compassionately  upon  her  thin,  eager 
face,  her  poverty-stricken  mourning.  She  was 
obviously  relieved  at  his  quiet  composure.  "I 
just  wanted  to  tell  you  this;  that  it 's  not  revenge 
that  I  'm  after.  I  've  had  a  hard  life,  any  way 
you  look  at  it.  But  I  'm  in  Science  now  and  I  'm 
tryin'  to  tear  hate  out  of  my  heart.  I  have  n't 
got  any  hard  feelin's  against  you,  for  I  don't  be 
lieve,  I  never  will  believe  that  you  really  meant  to 
do  it." 

"Won't  you  sit  down?"  Kenwick  suggested, 
and  forced  her  gently  into  the  chair.  Then  he 
stood  beside  her,  one  hand  resting  upon  the  paper- 
littered  table.  "You  believe,  do  you,  that  I — am 
responsible  for  your  brother's  death?" 

She  was  looking  past  him,  through  the  narrow 
window  where  Dayton  stood  watching  her  curi 
ously.  "I  don't  know  just  what  to  think.  But 
I  wanted  you  to  know  that  I  'm  not  wishin'  you — 
any  violent  end.  I  never  dreamed  there  was  any 
thing  so  horrible  connected  with  his  death  when 


206  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

I  came  out  here.  But  I  felt  that  I  had  to  know 
about  him;  I  had  to  find  out." 

"Of  course  you  had  to  find  out,"  Kenwick 
agreed  earnestly.  "This  thing  must  be  cleared  up 
in  your  mind — in  everybody's  mind.  May  I  ask 
you  a  personal  question,  Mrs.  Fanwell,  to  help  me 
clear  up  a  part  of  it  myself?  Were  you  de 
pendent  upon  your  brother  to  any  degree  for  your 
support?" 

"Dependent  on  Ralph?'9  The  astonishment  in 
her  tone  was  sufficient  reply  in  itself.  "Oh,  no. 
I  was  tryin'  to  help  Ralph  out,  as  much  as  I 
could  without  lettin'  my  husband  know.  It  was 
hard,  havin'  always  to  stand  between  them.  But 
I  could  n't  blame  my  husband  either.  He  was 
always  hard-workin'  himself  and  he  had  n't  any 
patience  with  poor  Ralph.  He  thought  he  ought 
to  get  a  steady  job  at  carpentry;  that  was  his 
trade,  and  he  made  good  at  it  till  he  got  sick  and 
began  takin'  that  terrible  stuif.  It  was  the  ruin 
of  him." 

"You  mean  that  he  took — drugs'?" 

She  nodded.  And  Kenwick  hastened  to  cover 
the  pitiful  little  secret  which  he  had  laid  bare. 

"It  was  only  for  this  reason  that  I  asked,  Mrs. 
Fanwell.  If  I  am  proved  guilty  of  this  crime,  you 
shall  receive  whatever  money  recompense  it  is  in 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  207 

my  power  to  give.  This  is  not  an  attempt  to  pay 
for  it,  but  only  to  ease  my  own  conscience." 

The  woman's  eyes  filled  with  tears.  She  leaned 
beseechingly  across  the  table,  clutching,  with 
strange  incongruity,  one  of  the  perfumed  en 
velopes.  "Then  you  are  guilty !"  she  cried.  "Oh, 
Mr.  Kenwick,  why  don't  you  confess*?  All  the 
lawyers  have  told  me  that  if  you  confess,  they 
can't  give  you  the  death  sentence.  And  you  had  n't 
ought  to  be  in — in  a  place  like  this.  Now  that 
I  've  seen  you  I  know  that  what  the  others  say 
is  n't  so.  You  did  it  when  you  was  crazy.  You 
never  would  have  done  it  if  you  had  been  in  your 
right  mind." 

She  rose  and  moved  slowly  toward  the  door, 
her  gaze  still  fixed  upon  him  with  a  mixture  of 
pleading  and  horror.  He  followed,  and  opened 
the  door  himself.  "I  'm  glad  you  came,  Mrs. 
Fanwell.  It  was  very  kind  indeed  of  you  to 


come." 


She  stopped  with  her  hand  upon  the  knob.  "I 
don't  care  what  he  says,"  she  told  him  tremu 
lously.  "I  don't  care  what  anybody  says;  they 
can't  none  of  them  make  me  believe  that  you 
would  have  done  it  if  you  'd  known  what  you 
was  about." 

When  she  had  gone  Kenwick  drew  a  long  sigh. 


208  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

The  thing  had  come  near  to  shattering  his  la 
boriously  constructed  mask.  He  spoke  sharply 
to  the  man  at  the  window.  "What  in  the  world 
did  she  mean  by  that,  Dayton?  They  're  cer 
tainly  not  trying  to  make  her  believe  that  I  killed 
her  brother  when  I  was  in  my  right  mind?" 

Dayton  took  a  few  slow  steps  toward  him.  "I 
was  trying  to  lead  up  to  that  when  she  came  in. 
But  it  Js  just  as  well  to  have  had  you  get  it  from 
her.  Now  maybe  you  Jll  take  more  stock  in  it. 
That  is  exactly  what  they  're  trying  to  make  her 
think;  what  they  '11  try  to  make  the  court  think. 
Glover  is  going  to  try  to  prove  (and  he  '11  come 
within  an  ace  of  doing  it,  too)  that  when  you 
were  in  your  right  mind  you  deliberately  plotted 
to  kill  that  man.  He  has  the  witnesses  and  the 
motive,  and  the  thing  that  he  's  going  to  attempt 
to  saddle  upon  you,  Mr.  Kenwick  is — murder  in 
the  first  degree." 


CHAPTER  XVI 

ON  the  day  set  for  the  trial  of  the  Regan 
murder  case  the  court-room  at  Mont-Mer 
was  crowded.  Long  before  ten  o'clock  men  and 
women  were  flocking  into  the  building,  eager 
for  the  most  desirable  seats.  Residents  from 
some  of  the  country  districts  brought  their  lunches 
and  prepared  to  spend  the  day. 

The  court-house  was  an  antique  structure 
heated  only  by  wood  stoves,  but  the  fur-coated 
and  the  threadbare  rubbed  elbows  and  were  ob 
livious  of  drafts.  For  it  is  in  the  audience  cham 
ber  of  a  criminal  court  that  those  who  seek  will 
find  the  true  democracy.  One  touch  of  sensation 
makes  the  whole  world  kin. 

A  few  hours  before  the  trial  Clinton  Morgan 
arrived  in  town  and  was  permitted  to  see  the 
prisoner.  The  vigilance  of  the  Mont-Mer  officials 
did  not  preclude  visitors,  rather  welcomed  them 
as  a  possible  means  of  gaining  valuable  infor 
mation  from  the  suspected  murderer  when  he  was 
off  his  guard.  Dayton,  who  was  in  conference 

209 


2 10  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

with  his  client  when  Clinton  entered,  was  im 
mensely  relieved  by  the  appearance  of  this  new 
actor  in  the  drama.  "This  thing  seems  to  me 
to  be  a  little  too  one-sided,  professor,"  he  re 
marked  when  introductions  were  over.  "The 
court- room  over  there  is  jammed  with  people  who 
expect  to  see  us  done  to  death.  It 's  good  to  have 
an  ally  loom  up  in  the  offing." 

He  left  them  alone  for  a  few  moments  while 
they  waited  for  the  sheriff,  and  Clinton  measured 
his  friend  with  an  anxious  eye.  "I  don't  know 
what  you  could  have  thought  of  me  for  not  com 
ing  sooner,"  he  said,  "but  I  could  n't  possibly  get 
away.  You  look  all  in,  man.  Have  n't  they  been 
giving  you  anything  to  eat?" 

"As  much  as  I  wanted."  As  he  returned  the 
grip  of  his  hand,  Kenwick  was  wondering  if 
Clinton  Morgan  suspected  that  this  encounter,  in 
a  prison  cell,  between  himself  and  the  brother 
of  Marcreta  filled  his  cup  of  humiliation  to  the 
brim.  Her  name  was  not  mentioned  by  either  of 
them.  Clinton's  whole  attention  was  centered 
upon  the  developments  in  the  case. 

"You  're  not  going  to  take  the  stand  your 
self,  are  you,  Kenwick?"  he  questioned,  standing 
with  one  .foot  upon  the  backless  chair. 

"I  was,  but  Dayton  has  advised  against  it." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  211 

"Absolutely.  You  'd  be  at  an  immense  dis 
advantage." 

"I  suppose  so.  I  can  furnish  proof  from  Dr. 
Gregson  Bennet,  in  the  city,  that  I  'm  perfectly 
normal  now.  But  after  all,  that  does  n't  really 
count  for  much  with  anybody  but  myself.  It  was 
such  an  immense  comfort  to  me  when  he  made  the 
examination.  I  came  away  from  his  office  feeling 
that  it  was  going  to  clear  up  everything.  But 
no  matter  what  science  says,  I  '11  always  be  at  a 
disadvantage." 

Clinton  laid  a  hand  upon  his  shoulder.  Ever 
since  his  first  sight  of  him  he  had  been  trying  to 
conceal  the  fact  that  Kenwick's  altered  appear 
ance  was  a  shock  to  him.  And  like  the  attempts 
of  most  straightforward  men,  the  effort  had  been 
a  failure.  "Why,  buck  up,  man,"  he  admonished 
now.  "They  can't  convict  you,  you  know;  not 
under — the  circumstances.  You  haven't  been 
thinking  that4?" 

"I  've  been  thinking  a  good  many  things  since 
I  came  back  to  Mont-Mer,"  Kenwick  answered 
slowly.  "You  see,  Morgan,  I  know  more  now 
than  I  did  when  I  was  trying  to  ferret  this  thing 
out  up  in  the  city.  For  one  thing,  I  know  a  little 
more  about  my  adversary.  As  I've  figured  out 
this  story  now,  it  goes  something  like  this. 


2 12  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"After  that  adventure  out  at  Rest  Hollow, 
Glover  found  himself  in  a  hole.  But  there  were 
three  ways  out  of  it  for  him.  If  he  wanted  to 
retain  the  grip  that  I  think  he  has  upon  my  estate, 
he  had  to  choose  between  these.  The  first  one 
was  to  make  it  appear  that  I  was  dead.  This 
seems,  at  first  thought,  to  be  a  hazardous  venture, 
but  it  was  not  so  difficult  in  my  case  as  it  would 
have  been  under  normal  circumstances.  And 
when  he  first  decided  to  take  it  I  think  he  sup 
posed  that  I  was  dead.  He  had  every  reason  to 
think  so.  The  man  to  whom  he  had  entrusted  me 
had  mysteriously  disappeared,  and  he  had  some 
strange  woman  come  down  and  identify  as  him 
self  a  stranger  who  had  been  killed  in  an  automo 
bile  tragedy ;  a  very  easy  thing,  in  reality,  you  see. 
When  Glover  discovered,  upon  inquiry  around 
town,  that  there  had  been  such  an  accident,  he 
concluded  that  I  had  been  killed  and  that  the  man 
who  was  responsible  for  it  was  afraid  to  let  him 
know  and  had  made  his  escape  after  having  him 
self  declared  dead.  I  have  n't  a  doubt  that 
Glover  thought  I  was  the  man  who  was  shipped 
up  to  San  Francisco  in  a  casket.  And  believing 
this,  the  whole  thing  seemed  to  play  right  into  his 
hands.  He  knew,  of  course,  that  he  could  n't 
keep  his  hold  on  my  fortune  forever,  but  he 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  213 

wanted  to  play  the  game  until  he  got  as  much 
as  he  could  out  of  it. 

"But  suddenly  he  discovered,  by  some  means, 
that  his  whole  hypothesis  was  wrong.  He  dis 
covered  that  I  was  alive,  and  what  was  infinitely 
more  appalling,  that  I  was  apparently  restored  to 
competency.  He  had  been  willing  to  risk  my 
possible  reappearance,  you  see,  for  if  I  were  ever 
discovered  wandering  about  deranged  somewhere, 
I  would  have  no  means  of  identifying  myself  and, 
after  a  medical  examination,  would  simply  be 
committed  to  some  institution.  He  would  not 
have  to  connect  himself  with  that  at  all.  But 
since  I  had  come  to  life  mentally  as  well  as  phys 
ically,  he  had  to  take  the  second  course — prove  me 
irresponsible  and  have  me  sent  to  an  asylum.  How 
he  went  about  this  I  don't  know,  but  I'm  sure  that 
he  must  have  attempted  it.  And  I  don't  know 
either  why  he  failed,  for  as  I  look  back  now  upon 
some  of  my  moves  I  can  see  that  they  might  have 
appeared — erratic." 

"I  think,"  Clinton  told  him  dryly,  "that  any 
of  us  could  furnish  convincing  proof  that  we  have 
been,  at  certain  periods  of  our  lives,  dangerous 
to  the  public  safety." 

But  Kenwick  went  on,  unheeding  this  at 
tempted  solace. 


2 14  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"At  any  rate,  Glover  apparently  failed  in  this 
attempt.  So  in  order  to  get  himself  out  of  this 
mess,  there  is  only  one  thing  now  for  him  to  do." 
He  broke  off,  eying  his  visitor  with  somber  eyes. 
"You  know  what  that  is,  Morgan.  In  order  to 
save  himself,  he  must  prove  me  to  be  a  cold 
blooded  murderer.  Can  he  do  it?  Why  should  n't 
he?  I  'm  certainly  not  in  a  position  to  offer  any 
convincing  opposition.  A  contemptuous  pity  is 
what  I  have  read  in  the  eyes  of  every  person 
whom  I  've  seen  since  this  thing  came  to  light. 
I  don't  suppose  there  is  a  person  in  this  town 
who  thinks  I  am  innocent.  I  don't  know  whether 
Dayton  himself  does." 

"But  what  motive  could  you  have  had  for 
murder,  Kenwick?  You  say  that  you  never  saw 
this  Regan  in  your  life." 

"I  say  so,  but  what  does  my  testimony  amount 
to?  And  especially  what  does  it  amount  to  when 
I  am  trying  to  save  my  own  skin?  I  told  you 
once,  Morgan,  and  I  tell  you  again  that  it 's  im 
possible  for  a  man  to  live  down  my  sort  of  a  past. 
He  may  get  his  eyes  back  out  of  the  bramble- 
bush,  but  he  '11  never  be  able  to  make  the  world 
believe  that  he  can  really  see  with  them.  I  feel 
sorry  for  Dayton.  He  's  working  day  and  night 
on  this  case,  and  he's  a  nice  fellow.  But  he 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  215 

has  n't  got  any  chance  to  make  good  on  it.  I  feel 
sorry  for  him." 

"I  have  been  thinking,"  Clinton  mused,  "that 
there  might  be  something  out  at  Rest  Hollow  that 
would  furnish  a  clue  to  help  solve  the  question 
to  the  satisfaction  of  the  jury,  as  to  just  when 
you  arrived  at  that  house,  how  long  you  stayed, 
and  so  on." 

"The  place  is  full  of  clues,  of  course,"  Ken- 
wick  admitted.  "But  by  this  time  they  have  all 
been  carefully  arranged.  Dayton  went  out  there, 
and  he  told  me  that  the  public  are  not  being  ad 
mitted  to  the  grounds  at  all.  The  place  is  under 
guard  night  and  day.  There  may  be  danger 
there  for  Glover;  I  don't  know  anything  about 
that,  of  course,  but  he  knows.  And  whatever  else 
you  may  say  about  him,  you  can't  say  that  he  has 
been  asleep  on  this  job." 

The  door  opened  to  admit  the  sheriff.  He 
shook  hands  with  Clinton  Morgan  and  nodded  to 
Kenwick.  In  absolute  silence  the  trio  walked 
through  the  semitropical  grounds  to  the  court 
house.  As  they  entered  the  packed  audience  cham 
ber  the  buzz  of  conversation  stopped,  and  in 
deathly  silence  Roger  Kenwick  took  his  place. 

The  barrage  of  eyes  leveled  upon  him  was  only 
partly  visible  through  the  haze  that  for  the  first 


2i6THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

few  moments  blurred  his  vision.  He  told  himself 
that  it  was  like  that  last  charge,  through  blinding 
smoke,  that  he  had  made  across  No-Man' s-Land. 
Then  the  scene  cleared  and  individual  faces 
emerged  from  the  mist.  There  were  the  weather- 
beaten  faces  of  ranch  workers,  the  smug,  compla 
cent  faces  of  those  whom  life  has  petted,  the  reso 
lute  faces  of  those  who  have  come  to  see  grim 
justice  administered.  Among  them,  here  and 
there,  was  a  scattering  of  veiled  faces;  women 
eager  to  see,  but  ashamed  of  being  seen.  Kenwick 
wondered  contemptuously  if  some  of  the  writers 
of  the  perfumed  notes  were  among  these. 

During  his  dispassionate  survey  of  the  specta 
tors  he  was  acutely  conscious  of  the  presence  of  a 
man  sitting  at  the  far  end  of  the  table  around 
which  the  lawyers  were  assembled.  He  had  felt 
this  personality  when  he  first  entered,  but  had 
reserved  his  attention  until  the  blur  of  his  sur 
roundings  should  clear.  Now  he  turned  slowly 
in  his  chair  and  looked  straight  into  the  "tiger 
eyes"  of  Richard  Glover.  There  was  neither 
anger  nor  appeal  in  his  own  face ;  only  a  curious, 
questioning  expression.  An  anthropologist  who 
has  stumbled  upon  some  strange  human  relic  un 
known  to  his  research  might  wear  such  an  ex 
pression.  Any  physiognomist  could  have  read  in 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  217 

Kenwick's  gaze  the  question,  "What  is  this  all 
about?" 

And  here  again  his  adversary  had  him  at  a 
disadvantage.  For  his  was  not  the  mobile  tempera 
ment  which  gives  visible  response  to  its  emotional 
experiences.  Life  played  upon  Kenwick  as  upon 
a  highly  strung  instrument,  and  drew  from  him 
whatever  notes  she  needed  in  the  universal  sym 
phony.  But  Richard  Glover  permitted  no  hand 
but  his  own  to  manipulate  the  keys  of  his  life- 
board. 

It  was  ten  o'clock  now  but  the  trial  seemed  long 
in  beginning.  The  judge  had  barely  noticed 
Kenwick's  entrance  and  continued  an  inaudible 
conversation  with  some  one  at  his  high  desk.  The 
district  attorney,  a  florid  little  man  who  seemed 
to  find  difficulty  in  keeping  on  his  eye-glasses, 
fussed  with  a  mass  of  papers  at  the  end  of  the 
long  table  and  spoke  occasionally  to  the  bald- 
headed  man  on  his  right,  who  was  evidently  his 
colleague.  Dayton  leaned  back  in  his  chair  and 
tapped  the  table  impatiently  with  his  pencil. 
Kenwick  was  surprised  to  see  that  the  nervousness 
which  his  attorney  had  shown  when  he  had  visited 
him  in  jail  seemed  now  to  have  completely  dis 
appeared. 

There  was  an  eminent  surgeon  among  Ken- 


2i8THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

wick's  New  York  acquaintances  who  suffered 
from  a  nervous  malady  that  was  akin  to  palsy, 
and  yet  who,  in  the  vital  crisis  of  an  operation, 
had  a  hand  as  steady  as  an  embedded  rock.  He 
found  himself  wondering  curiously  now  whether 
Dayton  would  develop  under  pressure  an  abnor 
mal  sagacity.  Some  miracle  would  have  to  inter 
vene  if  he  was  to  be  saved  from  the  ravenous 
clutches  of  fate. 

Other  persons  were  entering  the  court-room 
now  and  taking  places  that  had  evidently  been 
reserved  for  them.  Dayton  leaned  over  and  pre 
sented  them  at  long  distance  to  his  client.  "That 
fellow  that  just  came  in  is  Gifford,  the  under 
taker.  He  got  the  jolt  of  his  life  when  this  thing 
blew  up.  Don't  think  he  '11  be  much  of  a  witness. 
He  gets  rattled.  That  chap  with  him  is  Dr. 
Markham.  Ever  see  him  before?" 

Kenwick  nodded.  "He  bandaged  my  leg  that 
night  in  the  drug-store.  He  '11  remember  it,  too, 
for  he  was  a  little  suspicious  at  the  time  that  the 
sprain  was  older  than  I  admitted.  And  I  think 
he  knew  the  man  whose  name  I  chanced  to  give 


as  mine." 


"Yes,  that  was  a  bad  break,  your  chancing  up 
on  the  name  of  Rogers.  A  fellow  by  that  name 
was  visiting  out  at  the  Paddington  place,  and 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  219 

although  the  doctor  had  never  seen  him,  he  had 
an  engagement  to  play  golf  with  him  that  after 
noon  out  at  the  country  club.  Fortunately  the 
man  himself  left  town  the  next  day  so  it  wasn't  as 
bad  as  it  might  have  been.  But  it  was  an  unfor 
tunate  thing,  such  a  beast  of  a  thing,  that  you 
should  have  given  an  assumed  name  at  all." 

"I  suppose  so.  But  that  one  seemed  safe 
enough;  it  was  my  own  name  backwards.  And 
I  'd  been  through  enough  during  the  last  twenty- 
four  hours  to  make  me  cautious  and  secretive. 
And  as  it  turned  out,  the  taking  of  another  name 
was  the  thing  to  do,  Dayton.  If  I  had  hurled 
'Roger  Kenwick'  into  that  group,  I  imagine  that 
some  one  would  have  made  connections  and 
turned  me  over  to  the  lunacy  commission.  My 
guardian  angel  was  on  the  job  when  I  decided  to 
keep  my  identity  a  secret  that  night." 

Dayton  surveyed  him  with  obvious  satisfaction. 
It  was  a  good  sign  that  Kenwick  had  thrown  off 
some  of  his  former  apathy.  And  yet  there  still  re 
mained  a  cold  indifference  about  him,  a  sort  of 
contemptuous  disregard  of  the  crowded  room, 
that  for  a  man  of  Kenwick's  caliber  and  social  po 
sition  seemed  to  him  inexplicable.  He  had  an  un 
comfortable  conviction  that  this  inscrutable  self- 
possession  would  not  take  well  with  the  jury; 


220  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

that  it  somehow  gave  credence  to  the  theory  of  the 
prosecution  that  the  prisoner  was  a  hardened 
criminal.  The  local  reporters  were  already  busy 
with  their  pencils.  And  Dayton  could  visualize 
a  paragraph  in  the  evening  sheet  beginning, 
"Roger  Kenwick  himself  showed  a  complete  in 
difference  to  the  proceedings  which " 

The  conference  with  the  judge  had  ended  and 
he  was  rapping  for  order.  The  charge  against  the 
prisoner  was  read  and  the  tedious  task  of  im 
paneling  the  jury  began.  Dayton  paid  little  at 
tention  to  the  formal  process  of  getting  the  legal 
machinery  into  action,  except  to  object  in  a  deci 
sive  voice  to  three  or  four  of  the  prospective  jury 
men.  Aside  from  these  interruptions,  he  con 
tinued  to  identify  the  various  witnesses  to  his 
client,  in  an  impersonal,  entertaining  manner, 
like  the  official  guide  on  a  personally  conducted 
excursion. 

A  short,  ruddy  man  in  long  overcoat  entered 
and  cast  impatient  eyes  about  the  room  for  a  seat. 
One  was  immediately  brought  in  for  him  from  an 
adjoining  room.  "Annisen,  ex-coroner,"  Dayton 
explained.  "He  's  got  a  fine  position  now  as 
health  officer  somewhere  in  Missouri.  He  hated 
like  hell  to  come  back  and  get  mixed  up  in  this 
fracas.  You  see,  he  never  was  a  howling  success 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  221 

out  here;  made  the  mistake  of  knocking  the  cli 
mate  when  he  first  came  out,  and  no  southern 
California  town  can  stand  for  that.  And  then, 
he  had  too  many  irons  in  the  fire  all  the  time,  and 
neglected  his  official  position  sometimes.  I  have 
a  haunting  suspicion  myself  that  he  did  n't  spend 
any  too  much  of  his  valuable  time  over  the  ex 
amination  of  your  supposed  remains.  We  don't 
need  to  fear  him;  he  '11  be  a  reluctant  witness." 

He  swung  about  in  his  chair  to  announce  him 
self  satisfied  with  the  twelve  men  who  had  been 
selected  to  try  the  case,  and  then  engaged  for  a 
moment  in  conversation  with  the  district  attor 
ney. 

Kenwick  turned  his  gaze  to  the  window  where 
he  could  see  the  date-palms  from  a  new  angle, 
their  curving  leaves  motionless  now  in  the  still 
wintry  air.  The  swinging  doors  of  the  court-room 
fanned  incessantly  back  and  forth,  but  he  no 
longer  felt  any  interest  in  the  hostile  faces  of  the 
witnesses.  His  mind  was  wandering  back  along 
the  sun-lighted  path  of  his  boyhood  to  the  days 
when  he  had  mother,  father,  and  brother,  and  had 
never  suspected  that  he  would  ever  lose  any 
of  them.  It  was  a  good  thing,  though,  he  told 
himself  bitterly,  a  good  thing  that  they  were  gone ; 
that  the  last  of  the  Kenwicks  should  go  down  in 


222  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

disgrace  without  spreading  the  cankerous  taint  to 
anyone  else  of  that  proud  name.  The  imminent 
expose  appeared  to  him  all  at  once  in  the  guise 
of  a  mighty  tree,  which  was  holding  its  place  in 
the  earth  only  by  a  single  supporting  root.  Now 
that  root  was  to  be  chopped  away.  The  house  of 
Kenwick  was  to  fall.  But  in  its  fall  it  would 
harm  no  one  else.  For  the  tree  had  long  stood 
alone,  solitary  and  leafless  amid  the  white  wastes 
of  life. 

He  became  aware  at  last  that  the  buzzing  noise 
of  the  court-room  had  increased.  There  seemed 
to  be  some  new  excitement  in  the  air.  He  brought 
his  eyes  back  from  the  courtyard  and  glanced 
inquiringly  at  Dayton.  But  he  had  leaned  for 
ward  in  response  to  a  curt  signal  from  the  district 
attorney.  Every  one  except  the  jurymen  was 
talking  in  low  tones  with  some  one  else.  In  their 
double  row  of  seats  the  twelve  newly-sworn 
judges  sat  solemnly  silent,  freighted  with  a  sense 
of  their  responsibility. 

Whence  the  news  came  Kenwick  never  knew, 
for  during  the  moments  just  preceding  he  had 
been  deep  in  reverie  and  had  lost  connection  with 
his  surroundings.  But  whatever  it  was,  it  seemed 
all  at  once  to  be  upon  every  one's  tongue.  Those 
who  did  not  know  were  eagerly  seeking  informa- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  223 

tion  from  their  neighbors.  Kenwick's  eyes  swept 
the  room,  puzzled.  Dayton  would  doubtless  tell 
him  when  he  finished  his  conference.  But  before 
he  had  time  to  gain  the  knowledge  from  this 
source,  it  was  hurled  at  the  court-room  from  be 
hind  the  lawyer's  table.  The  district  attorney 
evidently  deemed  this  the  only  way  to  quiet  the 
increasing  tumult.  He  got  to  his  feet,  and  flap 
ping  the  fugitive  eye-glasses  between  his  fingers, 
faced  the  judge  and  made  one  brief  statement, 
unembellished  by  explanation  or  judicial  com 
ment. 

"Your  Honor,  news  has  just  been  received  from 
a  reliable  source  that  the  house  at  Rest  Hollow 
has  burned  to  the  ground !" 


v- 


CHAPTER  XVII 

THE  case  of  the  people  of  the  State  of  Cali 
fornia  against  Roger  Kenwick  opened  with 
the  testimony  of  Richard  Glover,  chief  witness 
for  the  prosecution.  Glover  took  the  stand 
quietly  and  told  his  story  in  lucid,  clear-cut  sen 
tences,  pausing  occasionally  to  recall  some  obscure 
detail  or  make  certain  of  a  date.  The  court 
reporter  found  it  easy  to  take  down  his  unhurried 
statements.  From  time  to  time  the  "freckled" 
eyes  of  the  narrator  rested  upon  the  man  in  the 
prisoner's  box  with  an  impersonal,  dispassionate 
glance.  And  always  he  met  those  of  Kenwick 
fixed  upon  his  face  with  a  sort  of  awed  fascina 
tion.  Just  so  might  the  victim  of  a  snake-charmer 
watch  him  while  he  disclosed  the  secret  of  his 
power. 

Richard  Glover  told  how  on  the  afternoon  of 
February  10,  1918,  he  had  been  summoned  to  the 
home  of  Everett  Kenwick  in  New  York  and  en 
trusted  with  a  commission.  He  was  not  known  to 
the  elder  Kenwick,  personally,  he  said,  but  had 
been  a  boyhood  friend  of  Isabel  Kenwick,  his 

224 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  225 

wife.  Prompted  by  her  recommendation,  Mr. 
Kenwick  had  chosen  him  for  the  delicate  family 
confidence  which  they  imparted. 

It  appeared  that  the  younger  brother  and  only 
living  relative  of  Everett  had  enlisted  in  the  ser 
vice,  and  after  several  months  of  severe  fighting 
at  the  front  had  been  wounded.  He  had  been 
sent  to  a  convalescent  home  in  England  where  his 
physical  health  had  been  almost  completely  re 
stored.  But  the  surgeons  had  discovered  that  the 
blow  on  his  head  had  caused  a  pressure  upon  the 
brain,  which  they  deemed  incurable  by  means  of 
surgery,  and  which  they  said  would  ultimately  re 
sult  in  some  form  of  mental  aberration.  So  they 
had  sent  him  back  to  New  York,  diagnosed  as  a 
permanent  invalid,  and  had  recommended  that 
a  close  watch  be  kept  upon  him  until  such  time 
as  it  might  be  necessary  to  commit  him  to  an  in 
stitution. 

During  the  first  few  weeks  after  his  return  it 
became  apparent  to  the  brother  and  sister-in-law 
that  this  diagnosis  of  the  unfortunate  young 
man's  condition  was  correct.  He  was  given 
isolated  quarters  upon  the  third  floor  of  the  house 
and  unostentatiously  watched.  Letters  which  he 
wrote  were  intercepted  and  his  friends  notified 
that  he  had  become  irresponsible.  Valuables  and 


226  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

possessions  which  had  been  intimately  associated 
with  his  past  life  were  removed  from  his  reach, 
since  they  appeared  to  confuse  him  and  hasten 
his  mental  collapse.  At  the  time  when  he, 
Glover,  was  summoned  to  the  Kenwick  home, 
prominent  brain  specialists  had  been  consulted 
and  had  agreed  that  an  operation  would  be  ex 
tremely  dangerous  to  the  patient  and  might  not 
succeed  in  restoring  him  to  normality.  And  Mr. 
Kenwick,  after  what  must  have  been  weeks  of 
painful  pondering,  had  decided  not  to  risk  it  bur 
to  follow  the  advice  of  the  physicians  and  provide 
for  his  brother  unremitting  guardianship.  Mrs. 
Kenwick  had  strongly  favored  a  private  sani 
tarium,  but  to  this  her  husband  would  not  con 
sent.  He  was  stricken  with  grief  and  was  deter 
mined  that  Roger  Kenwick's  share  of  the  family 
estate  should  be  spent  upon  his  comfort.  And 
he  refused  to  relinquish  all  hope  of  his  brother's 
ultimate  recovery.  In  spite  of  the  consensus  of 
professional  opinion  to  the  contrary,  he  still  clung 
to  the  hope  that  the  patient,  aided  by  rest  and 
youth,  would  recuperate.  And  he  was  a  shrewd 
enough  business  man  to  realize  that  private  sani 
tariums  for  the  mentally  disabled  thrive  in  pro 
portion  to  the  number  of  incurables  which  they 
maintain.  Complete  recovery  for  his  brother  was 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  227 

the  last  thing  that  he  might  expect  if  he  surren 
dered  him  to  the  mercies  of  such  an  asylum. 

And  so  he  had  commissioned  the  witness  to 
rent  for  him  the  California  home  of  Charles  Rae- 
burn,  an  old  family  friend,  who  had  built  it  for 
his  bride  about  twelve  years  before,  but  had  closed 
it  and  returned  East  following  her  tragic  suicide 
there  a  few  months  after  their  marriage.  Rae- 
burn  had  offered  it  to  the  Kenwicks  with  the 
stipulation  that  the  apartments  which  had  been 
his  wife's  boudoir  and  sitting-room  should  not  be 
used.  And  Everett  Kenwick  accepted  the  sug 
gestion,  feeling  that  if  he  were  in  his  brother's 
position  he  would  wish  to  be  as  far  away  as  pos 
sible  from  the  surroundings  in  which  he  had 
grown  up,  and  particularly  from  the  curious  eyes 
of  former  acquaintances.  Glover  had  undertaken 
the  errand  and  departed  immediately  for  Mont- 
Mer  to  open  the  house  and  employ  a  suitable 
caretaker. 

"Just  a  moment,  Mr.  Glover."  It  was  Dayton 
who  interrupted  him.  "On  the  occasion  of  your 
call  at  the  Kenwick  home,  did  you  see — the  pa 
tient?' 

"I  did  not.  They  had  particularly  chosen  a 
time  for  the  interview  when  he  was  undergoing 
treatment  at  a  physician's  office." 


228  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"Why  did  they  object  to  your  seeing  him'?" 

"I  don't  think  they  did  object,  but  they  felt 
that  it  would  be  unwise  just  at  that  time.  The 
young  man  was  obsessed  with  the  idea  that  the 
house  was  full  of  strange  people;  that  there  was 
a  constant  stream  of  guests  coming  and  going. 
There  was  no  reason  why  I  should  see  him, 
so  they  planned  to  avoid  a  meeting." 

"As  a  matter  of  fact  did  you  ever  see  him  while 
he  was  under  your  surveillance*?" 

"No." 

"On  what  occasion  did  you  first  see  him?" 

"On  a  street  in  San  Francisco  about  two  months 
ago." 

"On  that  occasion  did  he  see  you?" 

"I  think  not." 

"Proceed." 

The  witness  went  on  to  relate  how  he  had  de 
parted  that  same  evening  from  New  York,  had 
opened  up  the  house  at  Mont-Mer,  and  secured 
the  services  of  a  man  whom  he  chanced  to  meet 
on  the  train  and  who  was  able  to  produce  evi 
dence  that  he  had  once  been  head  physician  at 
a  Los  Angeles  sanitarium. 

Here  Dayton  cut  in  again.  "What  was  the 
name  of  this  man?" 

"Edward  Marstan." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  229 

"Proceed." 

Arrangements  having  been  made  with  him,  the 
witness  communicated  with  Everett  Kenwick,  ac 
cording  to  agreement,  and  the  patient  was  sent 
West  in  care  of  an  attendant,  one  Thomas  Bailey, 
now  deceased.  Glover  himself  had  been  in  Los 
Angeles  at  the  time  of  their  arrival,  but  had  re 
ceived  word  from  Marstan  that  the  patient  was 
properly  installed  at  the  Raeburn  residence,  and 
the  attendant  returned  to  New  York. 

Dayton's  voice  interposed  once  more.  "Is  the 
Charles  Raeburn  home  known  by  any  other  name, 
Mr.  Glover?' 

"Yes — by  the  name  of  Rest  Hollow." 

"Proceed." 

"My  own  concern  in  the  affair  was  simply  that 
of  business  manager,"  the  witness  continued,  "so 
I  remained  in  Los  Angeles  for  I  could  manage 
the  financial  end  of  it  just  as  well  from  that  short 
distance." 

The  district  attorney  suddenly  broke  the  thread 
of  the  story  here.  "Then  you  deliberately 
avoided  an  encounter  with  the  patient*?" 

"I  did." 

"Why?' 

"The  maladies  which  are  classed  as  mental  are 
particularly  repugnant  to  .me.  I  was  under  no 


230  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

obligation  to  see  him,  and  I  had  a  business  of  my 
own  to  which  this  was  merely  a  side  issue." 

"But  it  is  true,  is  it  not,"  Dayton  cut  in,  "that 
you  received  a  generous  salary  from  Mr.  Everett 
Kenwick  for  this — long  distance  supervision *?" 

"I  received  from  him  an  allowance  to  be  spent 
upon  the  upkeep  of  the  grounds,  the  comfort  of 
the  patient,  the  wages  of  an  attendant,  and  so  on. 
I  sent  him  a  monthly  statement  of  the  bills  when 
I  had  received  and  checked  them." 

"You  say  you  had  another  business;  what 
was  it4?" 

"Publicity  writer  for  the  Golden  State  Land 
Co.  of  Los  Angeles." 

"They  own  large  mineral  spring  holdings  in 
our  neighboring  county  on  the  south,  do  they 
not?' 

"Yes." 

"And  how  long  had  you  been  interested  with 
them  at  the  time  of  this  interview  at  the  Kenwick 
home'?" 

"About  six  months,  I  think." 

"Did  Mr.  Kenwick  know  of  this  other  busi 
ness  interest  ?" 

"Certainly.  That  is  one  thing  that  led  to 
his  choosing  me  as  his  agent.  He  knew  that  I 
was  permanently  located  in  southern  California 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  231 

and  that  I  had  established  myself  with  a  reput 
able  company.  It  was  a  guarantee  of  permanence 
— and  character." 

"One  moment  longer,  Mr.  Glover,  before  you  go 
on.  Was  the  elder  Mr.  Kenwick  aware  of  the 
fact  that  while  you  were  in  his  employ  you  never 
visited  Rest  Hollow  but  once4?" 

"I  did  visit  Rest  Hollow.  I  went  there  every 
month  to  see  that  the  place  was  properly  kept  up 
and  the  attendant  on  duty.  But  I  always  went  at 
night.  I  held  my  interviews  with  Dr.  Marstan 
alone." 

"Go  on." 

The  narrative  skipped  now  to  the  following 
November  when  the  witness  told  of  having  re 
ceived  a  communication  from  Dr.  Marstan  in 
forming  him  that,  owing  to  a  mechanical  acci 
dent,  Roger  Kenwick  had  recovered  his  sanity; 
that  he,  the  physician,  had  carefully  tested  him 
and  was  fully  convinced  of  this.  It  had  been 
impossible  just  at  that  time  for  Glover  himself 
to  go  to  Mont-Mer  as  he  was  ill.  And  before 
he  had  had  time  to  send  more  than  a  brief  note 
in  reply,  the  attendant  wrote  again  saying  that 
his  former  patient  was  bitterly  opposed  to  having 
his  brother  know  of  his  recovery,  and  had  threat 
ened  him,  the  doctor,  if  he  betrayed  the  news. 


232  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Kenwick,  he  said,  wished  to  use  his  present  posi 
tion  to  get  more  money  out  of  his  brother  for 
some  investment  that  he  was  then  planning,  for 
he  knew  that  in  case  his  recovery  were  known, 
it  would  be  a  long  time  before  the  court  would 
grant  him  the  control  of  his  property,  and  his 
fathers  will  had  provided  that  he  was  not  to 
inherit  his  half  of  the  estate  until  he  should  have 
reached  the  age  of  twenty-five. 

The  witness  had  not  thought  it  expedient  to 
notify  Dr.  Marstan  of  the  elder  Kenwick's  death, 
so  that  he  could  not  report  this  to  the  patient. 
They  had  evidently  had  hot  words  upon  the  sub 
ject  of  the  disclosure  of  the  patient's  condition, 
Marstan  being  highly  scrupulous  and  not  being 
willing  to  retain  his  position  as  keeper  when  it 
was  merely  nominal,  an  arrangement  upon  which 
the  young  man  himself  insisted. 

In  order  to  prevent  the  patient  from  carrying 
out  some  sinister  threat,  Marstan  had  locked  his 
charge  into  the  house  and  gone  into  town  prob 
ably  to  consult  a  lawyer  upon  the  proper  course 
for  him  to  pursue.  This  much  he  could  surmise 
from  a  half-written  letter  which  the  witness  him 
self  had  found  on  the  evening  that  he  returned  to 
Mont-Mer. 

"And  that  was  the  state  of  things  when  you 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  233 

arrived  at  Rest  Hollow  on  the  evening  of  Novem 
ber  21?"  Dayton  asked. 

"That  was  the  state  of  things." 

"Describe  the  condition  of  the  house  and 
grounds  on  the  evening  of  the  tragedy." 

The  witness  did  so,  with  the  same  unhurried 
attention  to  detail. 

"And  when  you  came  upon  the  body  of  the 
dead  man  under  the  dining-room  window,  why 
did  you  conclude  that  it  was  your  former  charge, 
Roger  Kenwick4?" 

"Every  circumstance  seemed  to  point  to  it. 
And  I  found  upon  the  body  possessions  that 
seemed  unmistakable  evidence." 

"Describe  those  possessions." 

"A  wrist-watch  with  the  initials  R.K.  upon  the 
inside;  a  silver  match-case  with  the  one  initial 
K. ;  a  linen  handkerchief  with  that  initial." 

"But  you  said,  did  you  not,  in  the  early  part  of 
your  testimony,  that  the  patient's  personal  pos 
sessions  had  been  taken  from  him  when  he  became 
incompetent?" 

"They  had.  But  all  of  his  things  were  in  Doc 
tor  Marstan's  possession.  They  were  in  his  apart 
ments,  and  any  normal  person  could  easily  have 
found  them,  and  naturally  Kenwick  would  have 
demanded  them." 


234  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"Had  you  ever  seen  a  picture  of  Roger  Ken- 
wick  to  aid  you  in  your  identification  of  his 
body?' 

"No.  But  I  knew  his  age,  and  it  seemed  to  cor 
respond  exactly  with  that  of  the  dead  man. 
Furthermore  he  looked  like  a  person  who  was 
wasted  by  ill  health.  I  hadn't  a  doubt  that  it 
was  he." 

"How  did  you  think  that  he  had  met  his 
death?5 

"By  suicide.  I  believed  then  that  the  doctor 
had  been  mistaken  and  that  he  had  not  made  a 
complete  recovery." 

"When  did  you  begin  to  suspect,  Mr.  Glover, 
that  instead  of  being  dead,  the  prisoner  was  a 
deliberate  murderer?' 

"Not  until  I  discovered  that  he  had  made  his 
escape  from  Rest  Hollow.  I  saw  his  name  on  a 
hotel  register  in  San  Francisco  and  I  became 
alarmed  and  put  a  detective  on  his  track,  for  I 
felt  responsible  for  him  and  was  not  convinced 
that  he  should  be  at  large.  But  the  detective 
reported  to  me  that  Kenwick  showed  absolutely 
no  signs  of  abnormality.  Then  I  came  down  here 
and  followed  the  back  trail.  And  I  discovered 
that  Marstan  had  been  killed  in  an  automobile 
accident  on  the  day  when  he  had  come  into  town 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  235 

for  legal  aid.  By  inquiring  of  the  gardener  at 
Rest  Hollow  I  learned  that  he  had  seen  a  young 
man  out  under  the  dining-room  window  talking  to 
Kenwick  early  in  the  afternoon.  The  prisoner 
was  entreating  this  stranger  to  let  him  out 
and " 

"Let  that  witness  give  his  own  testimony. 
That  will  do,  Mr.  Glover."  Then,  as  he  was 
about  to  leave  the  stand,  "No,  just  a  minute. 
You  say  it  was  about  midnight  when  you  dis 
covered  the  body.  Did  you  notify  the  coroner*?" 

"That  was  my  first  impulse;  but  I  found  that 
the  telephone  was  out  of  order,  so  I  decided  to 
wait  until  it  was  light  before  going  in  for  him. 
But  in  the  morning,  just  as  I  finished  dressing,  he 
came.  He  told  me  that  he  had  been  notified  by 
some  one  else." 

"By  whom?' 

"I  don't  know.  He  said»that  he  was  out  of  town 
when  the  message  came  in,  and  found  it  awaiting 
him  when  he  returned.  I  got  the  impression  that 
he  did  n't  know  himself  who  had  reported  the 
tragedy." 

This  last  testimony  corresponded  in  every  de 
tail  with  that  given  by  Annisen,  who  described  mi 
nutely  his  findings  upon  the  body,  the  discovery, 
a  short  distance  away,  of  the  loaded  revolver  with 


236  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

a  shot  fired  out  of  it,  and  the  haggard  condi 
tion  of  the  face,  indicating  long  invalidism.  The 
body,  he  said,  had  lain  in  the  morgue  until  the 
following  afternoon  and  been  viewed  by  scores 
of  the  morbidly  curious.  Not  one  person  had 
recognized  it,  nor  apparently  entertained  the 
slightest  suspicion  that  it  was  not  the  unfortunate 
inmate  of  Rest  Hollow.  And  so  he  had  felt 
justified  in  accepting  Richard  Glover's  declara 
tion  of  the  dead  man's  identity.  He  knew  that 
the  patient's  keeper  had  been  killed  in  an  auto 
mobile  accident  the  day  before,  and  every  cir 
cumstance  seemed  to  point  to  a  suicidal  frenzy. 

His  story  was  followed  by  that  of  a  gawky, 
frightened-looking  boy  who  kept  his  eyes  riveted 
upon  the  prosecution's  chief  witness  while  he 
talked.  He  disclaimed  all  knowledge  of  the  ar 
rangements  concerning  the  patient's  guardianship, 
his  business  being  merely  to  care  for  the  garden 
and  furnace.  He  had  never  come  into  close  con 
tact  with  the  patient  himself;  had  only  seen  him 
at  a  distance  sometimes,  wandering  about  the 
grounds  alone.  He  had  always  seemed  perfectly 
quiet  and  harmless,  but  he,  the  gardener,  had  been 
afraid  that  he  might  some  time  have  a  "spell" 
such  as  he  had  heard  of  in  similar  cases,  and  so 
had  kept  carefully  out  of  his  way. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  237 

In  the  late  afternoon  of  November  21,  he  re 
ported,  when  he  returned  from  a  far  corner  of 
the  place  where  he  had  been  pruning,  he  had 
found  the  patient  lying  in  a  faint  on  the  floor  of 
the  garage.  With  some  effort  he  had  dragged  him 
into  the  house  and  left  him  in  the  drawing-room, 
after  bandaging  his  swollen  leg  as  well  as  he  could 
and  forcing  part  of  a  glass  of  whisky  down  his 
throat.  Then  he  had  departed,  after  first  making 
sure  that  the  doors  and  windows  on  the  ground 
floor  were  securely  fastened.  Late  the  following 
afternoon  he  had  seen  the  prisoner  standing  at 
the  dining-room  window  and  had  heard  him  call 
out  in  a  threatening  way  to  him.  A  moment 
afterward,  without  the  slightest  warning,  the  pa 
tient  had  doubled  his  fist  and  smashed  the  pane 
of  glass  to  fragments.  Convinced  that  this  was 
one  of  the  "spells"  which  he  had  dreaded,  he 
had  waited  until  he  thought  the  patient  was  in 
bed  and  had  then  returned  and  boarded  up  the 
window. 

Here  Dayton  interrupted.  "And  you  believed 
the  man  in  the  house  to  be  ill  and  alone,  and  yet 
you  felt  no  concern  about  his  care*?" 

"I  did  n't  think  he  was  alone.  I  had  seen  a 
woman  around  the  place  that  afternoon,  and  I 
thought  she  was  his  nurse." 


238  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

A  murmur  swept  around  the  breathless  court 
room.  Everybody  in  the  audience  made  some 
comment  to  his  neighbor  upon  this  new  develop 
ment.  The  judge  rapped  sharply  for  order.  "Go 
on,"  commanded  the  district  attorney. 

The  witness  proceeded  to  relate  that  he  had 
gone  to  bed  that  night  feeling  nervous  over  the 
patient's  conduct  and  had  resolved  to  give  up 
his  employment  at  Rest  Hollow.  About  eleven 
o'clock  he  had  been  roused  from  a  fitful  sleep  by 
a  knock  at  his  door.  Upon  opening  it  he  had 
found  Gifford,  the  undertaker,  standing  on  the 
threshold.  Here  he  endeavored  to  recollect  the 
exact  words  of  the  night  caller,  and  after  a  mo 
ment's  pause,  produced  the  greeting:  "Get  up, 
boy.  Do  you  know  that  there 's  been  murder 
committed  on  this  place  to-night?"  With  Gifford 
he  had  hurried  around  to  the  dining-room  side  of 
the  house  and  had  discovered  the  dead  body  lying 
there  under  an  oleander  bush,  near  the  very  win 
dow  which  the  patient  had  so  unaccountably 
broken  that  same  afternoon.  Terrified,  he  had 
not  paused  to  give  the  body  even  a  fleeting  glance, 
but  had  stumbled  back  to  his  room  and  made  a 
hasty  bundle  of  his  clothes,  determined  not  to 
pass  another  hour  on  that  place.  He  remembered 
Gifford  calling  after  him  that  he  was  not  going  to 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  239 

touch  the  body  until  the  coroner  had  seen  it.  Ten 
minutes  later  he  had  fled,  leaving  his  door  un 
locked  behind  him. 

He  was  dismissed  from  the  stand,  and  after  a 
moment  of  whispered  parley,  came  the  demand, 
"Call  Arnold  Rogers." 

A  young  man  wearing  heavy-rimmed  glasses 
took  the  stand  and  told  of  his  encounter  with  the 
prisoner  on  the  evening  of  November  21.  He 
described  the  scene  at  the  gate  in  careful  de 
tail,  halting  frequently  to  correct  himself.  The. 
district  attorney  interrupted  him  in  mid-sen 
tence. 

"Did  it  strike  you  at  any  time  during  the  dia 
logue,  Mr.  Rogers,  that  the  man  inside  the 
grounds  might  be — irrational?" 

"Yes,  but  that  idea  did  not  occur  to  me  until 
the  end  of  the  interview.  Being  a  complete 
stranger  in  the  community,  I  knew  nothing  about 
him,  of  course,  but  his  voice  and  method  of  appeal 
struck  me  as  being  a  little  abnormal,  and  when  I 
was  starting  away  and  he  stretched  a  letter 
through  the  gate  and  asked  me  to  mail  it  for  him 
I  was  convinced  that  he  was  not  rational.  I  was 
formerly  a  director  at  one  our  State  hospitals  for 
the  insane  and  I  know  that  the  mania  of  patients 
to  write  letters  and  ask  visitors  to  mail  them  is 


240  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

one  of  the  commonest  symptoms  of  their  afflic 
tion." 

"And  so  you  paid  no  attention  to  that  appeal?" 

"I  was  escorting  a  lady.  I  planned  to  take  her 
home  first  and  then  return  or  send  somebody.  My 
car  was  disabled  and  I  felt  responsible  for  my 
companion." 

"Who  was  the  lady?' 

"My  sister,  Mrs.  Paddington.  I  was  visiting  at 
her  home.  And  when  we  had  gone  on  our  way  she 
told  me,  what  I  had  already  begun  to  suspect, 
that  the  inmate  of  Rest  Hollow  was  a  mental  in 
valid;  that  he  was  well  cared  for,  and  although 
the  case  was  pathetic,  we  need  feel  under  no  obli 
gation  to  return.  His  attendant,  we  reasoned,  had 
already  discovered  him  by  that  time  and  taken 
him  back  to  the  house.  We  had  both  dismissed 
him  from  our  minds  when  about  half  an  hour 
later  a  woman  rushed  up  to  our  door,  breathless 
from  a  long  trip  by  foot,  and  told  us  that  the  in 
mate  of  Rest  Hollow  had  killed  himself;  that  she 
had  found  him  lying  dead  under  the  dining-room 
window.  I  don't  remember  just  who  'phoned  the 
news  in  to  the  proper  authorities,  but  I  think  it 
was  she.  My  sister  offered  to  send  her  into 
town  in  one  of  her  cars,  and  did  so.  We  never 
knew  her  name  nor  saw  her  again." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  241 

"And  you  credited  the  woman's  story  as  it 
stood?" 

"We  saw  no  reason  to  doubt  it.  It  fitted  ex 
actly  with  our  encounter  at  the  gate.  The  time 
was  a  coincidence,  too.  We  assumed  that  the 
young  man's  attendant  had  not  arrived  in  time 
to  save  him  from  suicide.  And  there  was  another 
reason,  too,  why  we  did  not  care  to  give  the 
matter  more  intensive  investigation."  He  stopped 
and  glanced  appealingly  at  his  questioner,  but 
there  was  no  relenting  in  the  lawyer's  eyes.  "My 
sister  had  a  guest  visiting  her  to  whom  the  name 
of  Roger  Kenwick  brought — unhappy  associa 
tions.  She  was  unfortunately  present  at  the  ar 
rival  of  the  woman  from  Rest  Hollow,  and  after 
the  shock  of  the  announcement  was  over  we  care 
fully  avoided  all  further  discussion  of  the 
tragedy.  The  following  morning,  in  courtesy  to 
our  guest,  I  went  over  to  the  Raeburn  house  with 
some  flowers  from  the  Utopia  gardens,  and  veri 
fied  the  report  that  the  patient  was  dead.  The 
next  day  my  sister's  friend  left  for  her  home  in 
San  Francisco  and  we  considered  the  affair  a 
closed  incident." 

The  testimony  of  the  other  witnesses  for  the 
prosecution  was  given  in  due  order,  and  the  case 
summed  up  against  Roger  Kenwick  charged  him 


242  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

with  having  laid  a  deliberate  plot  to  murder  Mar 
stan,  his  former  keeper,  he  being  the  only  man,  he 
thought,  who  could  interfere  with  his  financial 
plans,  and  prevent  him  from  playing  upon  his 
brother's  chivalric  affection. 

It  was  pointed  out  that  only  a  month  before 
his  recovery  the  Kenwick  estate  had  trebled  its 
value,  owing  to  the  fact  that  leather  goods,  which 
were  the  source  of  the  Kenwick  income,  had 
trebled  in  value  since  the  beginning  of  the  war. 
From  newspaper  accounts  and  discussions  with 
Marstan  himself,  the  recovered  patient  had 
shrewdly  sized  up  the  situation  and  laid  his  plans. 
It  was  previously  stated  that  the  elder  Kenwick 
had,  before  his  brother's  misfortune,  kept  a  jealous 
grip  upon  the  family  purse,  and  that  during  his 
college  days  at  the  State  University,  Roger  Ken 
wick  had  been  obliged  to  eke  out  his  allowance  by 
doing  newspaper  work  on  one  of  the  San  Francisco 
dailies.  Only  in  his  softened  mood  was  Everett 
Kenwick  to  be  counted  upon  for  continued  gener 
osity. 

On  the  day  of  the  tragedy,  the  ward  had 
watched  Marstan  closely  and  had  seen  him  de 
part  for  town.  Earlier  in  the  afternoon  he  had 
himself  shown  signs  of  violence  in  order  to  sus 
tain  the  impression  that  he  was  still  irresponsible. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  243 

Kenwick's  plan  to  kill  his  warden  was  perfectly 
safe,  for  he  knew  that  if  the  crime  ever  came  to 
light  he  could  be  cleared  on  an  insanity  charge. 
His  worse  punishment  would  be  commitment  to 
an  institution,  from  which  he  could  later  be 
released  by  proving  himself  cured. 

On  the  way  out  from  town  the  doctor's  car  had 
pitched  over  a  cliff,  killing  him  instantly.  Ken- 
wick,  ignorant  of  the  tragedy  and  lying  in  wait 
for  his  victim,  saw  a  man  steal  in  late  at  night 
through  the  side  entrance.  No  callers  ever  came 
to  the  place,  so  having  no  doubt  that  it  was  the 
returning  warden,  he  had  crept  up  behind  him 
in  the  darkness  and  shot  him  in  the  head  with  the 
revolver  which  his  attendant  always  kept  loaded 
for  an  emergency,  and  which  the  patient  by  spy 
ing  upon  his  warden  one  night,  had  discovered. 

A  few  minutes  previous  to  the  murder  he  had 
played  a  skilful  part  at  the  front  gate,  holding 
up  the  first  person  who  passed  and  telling  an  inco 
herent  story  which  he  knew,  coming  from  him, 
would  not  be  believed,  and  which  would  be  of 
valuable  assistance  in  case  it  were  ever  neces 
sary  to  prove  an  insanity  charge. 

When  he  discovered  that  he  had  killed  the 
wrong  man,  he  adopted  a  plan  which  proved 
him  not  only  rational  but  unusually  astute.  From 


244  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

a  previous  conversation  with  the  dead  man,  whom 
he  now  recognized  as  a  fellow  who  had  once  come 
in  to  assist  with  some  work  on  the  car,  he  knew 
him  to  be  a  stranger  in  the  community.  He  knew 
himself  to  be  equally  unknown,  except  by  name, 
and  it  was  an  easy  matter  to  exchange  identities. 
So  Kenwick  had  transferred  to  the  dead  man  cer 
tain  of  his  own  personal  possessions  which  he  dis 
covered  after  his  mental  recovery.  He  had  se 
lected  these  carefully  and  with  diabolical  cun 
ning,  placed  them  in  the  other  man's  pockets,  and 
then  made  his  escape  from  the  place  either  by 
foot  or  in  the  wagon  of  the  undertaker,  which 
must  by  this  time  have  arrived. 

When  he  reached  Mont-Mer,  the  testimony 
continued,  he  had  given  a  fictitious  name,  gained 
the  sympathy  and  credence  of  the  doctor  and  un 
dertaker,  and  finally,  by  a  clever  ruse,  escaped 
from  town  as  custodian  of  the  body  of  the  very 
man  whom  he  had  planned  to  kill.  Knowing  that 
Marstan  was  dead,  he  felt  himself  completely 
secure  and  foot-free  to  carry  out  his  designs.  The 
only  person  upon  whom  he  did  not  reckon,  be 
cause  he  did  n't  know  of  his  existence,  was 
Richard  Glover. 

The  one  missing  link  in  the  story  was  supplied 
by  evidence  which,  although  circumstantial, 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  245 

seemed  undeniably  convincing  to  the  jury.  The 
woman  who  had  notified  the  coroner  must  also 
have  been  an  inmate  of  Rest  Hollow,  the  mistress 
of  Marstan,  who  had  lived  in  ease  and  luxury,  un 
known  to  the  physician's  employer  or  any  one 
else.  She  knew  that  her  reputation  lay  in  Ken- 
wick's  hands.  She  was  tired  of  Marstan  and  was 
eager  but  afraid  to  escape.  The  criminal  had 
supplied  her  with  the  means  at  small  cost.  The 
time  of  the  disclosure  of  the  crime  had  been 
skilfully  worked  out  between  them.  And  it  had 
been  executed  with  a  masterly  skill.  Depot  au 
thorities  had  reported  later  that  a  woman  travel 
ing  alone  had  bought  a  ticket  on  the  late  train 
for  San  Francisco  that  evening.  The  station- 
agent  remembered  the  incident  perfectly.  By 
good  luck  Kenwick  had  caught  the  same  train. 
They  had  traveled  to  the  city  together. 

Glover,  who  had  been  recalled  to  the  stand  and 
was  giving  this  testimony,  stated  that  upon  dis 
missing  the  detective  from  his  employ  he  had 
followed  the  case  himself  and  was  certain  that 
Kenwick  and  his  accomplice  had  lived  together 
intermittently  in  San  Francisco,  and  that  he  had 
been  supplying  her  with  funds. 

It  was  at  this  point  that  Roger  Kenwick,  who 
had  been  sitting  like  a  man  frozen  to  his  chair, 


246  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

suddenly  electrified  the  court-room  by  springing 
to  his  feet.  He  had  forgotten  his  surroundings, 
was  contemptuous  of  the  formalities,  oblivious  to 
everything  save  the  insolent  assurance  in  Richard 
Glover's  eyes,  and  the  steady  gaze  with  which 
Marcreta  Morgan's  brother  was  regarding  him. 
His  sensitive  nostrils  quivered  like  those  of  a 
highly  strung  race-horse.  His  hands,  those  hands 
so  impatient  of  delay,  were  clenched  till  the 
knuckles  showed  through  the  drawn  skin  like 
knobs  of  ivory.  He  struggled  to  speak  but  no 
words  came.  Then  he  became  aware  of  the  fact 
that  the  sheriff  was  forcing  him  back  into  his  seat. 
Dayton  leaned  over  and  whispered  sharply  to 
him.  "Sit  down,  man.  You  '11  kill  your  case. 
What  do  you  want  them  to  think  of  you?" 

The  words  recalled  him  to  his  surroundings. 
From  sheer  physical  weakness  he  sank  back  into 
his  chair.  Another  moment  intervened  while  the 
auditors  relaxed  from  the  moment  of  tension. 
Then  out  of  the  deathly  silence  came  Dayton's 
voice  again,  calm  and  with  no  trace  of  excite 
ment. 

"You  say  that  when  you  first  discovered  the 
prisoner  in  San  Francisco  you  employed  a  detec 
tive  to  help  you  on  his  case,  Mr.  Glover.  Look 
around  the  court-room.  Is  that  man  present?" 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  247 

"He  is."  There  was  a  shade  of  reluctance  in 
the  reply. 

"What  is  his  name?' 

"Granville  Jarvis." 

The  next  moment  Glover  had  stepped  down 
from  the  stand  and  resumed  his  place  at  the  far 
end  of  the  long  table.  Dayton  leaned  across  to 
his  client.  "Jarvis?"  he  inquired,  his  pencil 
poised  above  his  pad.  "Granville  Jarvis;  is  that 
the  name?" 

The  light  had  gone  out  of  Ken  wick's  eyes  and 
the  fire  out  of  his  voice.  He  had  crumpled  down 
in  his  chair  like  a  man  suddenly  overcome  with  a 
spinal  disease.  He  looked  at  Dayton  with  dead 
eyes. 

"The  name,"  he  said  bitterly,  "is  Judas  Is- 
cariot!" 


CHAPTER  XVIII 

IT  was  two  o'clock  before  court,  which  had 
been  dismissed  for  lunch  after  Richard  Glov 
er's  testimony,  convened  again.  During  the  noon 
hour  a  tray  containing  the  only  tempting  food 
which  the  prisoner  had  seen  since  his  incarceration 
was  brought  up  to  his  cell.  It  had  become  ap 
parent  to  the  jailer  that  he  had  friends,  and 
perhaps  he  was  moved  thereby  to  a  tardy  com 
passion.  But  Kenwick,  despite  Dayton's  admoni 
tion  to  "Brace  up  and  eat  a  good  meal,"  waved  it 
indifferently  aside. 

"I  'm  done  for,"  he  said  simply.  "I  don't  see 
how  any  twelve  men  could  hear  the  evidence  that 
was  presented  this  morning  and  find  me  innocent. 
And  by  the  time  Jar  vis  gets  through  telling  any 
thing  he  likes,  and  proving  it Well,  it  ap 
pears  that  every  person  who  has  been  connected 
in  any  way  with  me  since  this  trouble  fell  upon 
me  has  taken  advantage  of  my  misfortune  to  en 
rich  himself.  I  don't  care  much  now  what  they 
do  with  me.  When  you  lose  your  faith  in  hu 
manity  it 's  time  to  die.  I  'm  no  religious  fana- 

248 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  249 

tic,  Dayton,  but  for  these  last  two  months  I  Ve 
thanked  God  on  my  knees  every  night  of  my 
life  for  having  brought  me  back  into  the  light. 
Now  I  wish  that  I  had  died  instead." 

Dayton  made  no  further  effort  to  rouse  him 
from  his  despair.  For  although  not  of  a  sensi 
tive  or  particularly  intuitive  temperament  him 
self,  he  had  come  to  realize  the  utter  impossi 
bility  of  finding  this  other  man  in  his  trouble. 
"You  don't  seem  to  have  much  faith  in  me,"  was 
all  he  said  as  he  made  some  notes  on  the  back 
of  an  envelope.  But  he  finally  induced  his  client 
to  eat  some  of  the  food  upon  his  tray  and  after 
the  first  few  mouthfuls  Kenwick  was  surprised 
to  find  that  he  was  ravenously  hungry. 

"That 's  something  like,"  the  lawyer  approved, 
as  they  made  their  way  back  through  the  court 
house  grounds.  "Now  you  're  good  for  another 
three  hours." 

It  had  n't  seemed  possible  to  Kenwick  that  he 
was,  that  his  nerves  could  stand  the  strain  of 
hours  and  hours  more  of  this,  and  there  was  no 
assurance  that  the  ordeal  would  end  to-day  or 
to-morrow.  But  Dayton's  easy  assurance  gave 
him  a  new  grip  upon  himself. 

They  found  the  audience  waiting  and  eager. 
None  of  them  seemed  to  have  moved  since  they 


250  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

had  been  dismissed  for  recess  two  hours  before. 
Only  the  jury  were  absent,  but  five  minutes  after 
Kenwick's  arrival  they  filed  in  and  took  their 
places.  The  district  attorney  appeared  to  have 
lost  interest  in  the  case.  He  sat  staring  out  of 
the  window  with  a  sort  of  wistful  impatience  as 
though  he  were  visualizing  a  potential  game  of 
golf.  Dayton  glanced  at  some  notes  on  the  table 
at  his  elbow  and  issued  his  first  command.  "Call 
Madeleine  Marstan." 

In  response  to  this  summons  one  of  the  veiled 
women  in  the  rear  of  the  room  rose  and  came 
forward.  She  was  quietly  dressed  in  a  gown  of 
clinging  black  silk  and  a  black  turban  with  a 
touch  of  amethyst.  Every  eye  in  the  court-room 
was  fixed  upon  her,  but  she  took  the  oath  with 
the  unembarrassed  self-possession  of  one  long  ac 
customed  to  the  public  gaze.  Kenwick,  turned 
toward  her,  detected  a  faint  odor  of  heliotrope. 

"Where  do  you  live,  Mrs.  Marstan?"  Dayton 
inquired. 

She  gave  a  street  and  number  in  San  Francisco. 

"What  is  your  occupation*?" 

"I  am  an  actress." 

"Do  you  know  the  prisoner*?" 

Without  glancing  at  him  she  replied,  with  her 
unruffled  composure,  "I  do." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  251 

"How  long  have  you  known  him*?" 

"About  two  months." 

"Describe  the  occasion  on  which  he  was  first 
brought  to  your  notice." 

She  settled  back  slightly  in  her  chair,  like  a 
traveler  making  herself  comfortable  for  what 
promised  to  be  a  long  journey.  "It  was  on  the 
afternoon  of  November  19  that  my  husband,  a 
physician,  came  into  our  apartment  in  San  Fran 
cisco  and  announced  to  me  that  he  had  just 
secured  a  remunerative  position  with  a  wealthy 
man  down  at  Mont-Mer.  He  said  that  the  work 
would  begin  immediately  and  we  must  be  ready 
to  leave  the  following  day.  I  asked  him  for 
more  details  and  he  told  me  that  the  position 
was  a  secretaryship  which  would  involve  little 
labor  and  afford  us  a  luxurious  home  with  ex 
cellent  salary.  He  had  never  been  a  success  in 
his  profession,  owing  chiefly  to  the  fact  that  he 
was  dissipated,  and  I  had  seriously  considered 
leaving  him  and  going  back  to  the  stage.  But 
I  had  decided  to  give  him  another  chance,  and 
since  he  appeared  to  find  my  questions  concerning 
this  new  work  annoying,  I  agreed  to  go  and  allow 
him  to  explain  more  fully  when  we  should 
arrive. 

We  went  down  in  our  own  car  and  arrived  at 


252  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Rest  Hollow  in  mid-afternoon.  My  husband 
showed  me  over  the  house  and  grounds  and  I 
thought  I  had  never  seen  such  a  beautiful  place. 
There  was  no  one  about  when  we  came,  and 
after  he  had  given  me  every  opportunity  to  be 
favorably  impressed  with  the  new  home,  we  went 
to  an  upstairs  sitting-room  in  the  left  wing,  and 
he  told  me,  while  he  smoked  one  of  the  expensive- 
looking  cigars  that  he  found  there,  further  details 
concerning  his  employer.  I  learned  that  he  was 
an  invalid,  a  young  man  by  the  name  of  Roger 
Kenwick,  who  was  recuperating  from  too  stren 
uous  service  overseas.  We  discussed  the  matter 
for  only  a  few  minutes  before  my  husband  an 
nounced  that  it  was  time  for  him  to  go  to  the 
depot  and  meet  his  charge,  who  was  being  brought 
up  from  Los  Angeles  by  the  previous  companion, 
who  had  taken  him  there  to  be  outfitted  with 
winter  clothes. 

"This  development  in  the  case  rather  startled 
me,  and  as  we  walked  along  the  upper  hall  and 
over  into  the  right  wing,  which  he  said  had  been 
recently  cleaned  but  was  not  to  be  used,  I  de 
manded  more  specific  details  concerning  the  ar 
rangement.  I  wanted  particularly  to  know  why 
there  was  to  be  a  change  of  'secretaries'  and 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  253 

whether  the  young  man  himself  was  willing  to 
accept  the  companionship  of  people  whom  he  had 
never  seen. 

"My  husband  had  been  drinking.  I  think  he 
must  have  found  a  well-stocked  wine-closet  at 
Rest  Hollow.  And  he  finally  grew  furious  at  my 
insistence.  The  more  angry  he  became  the  more 
he  betrayed  to  me  the  fact  that  there  was  some 
thing  to  conceal.  He  had  never  told  me  the 
name  of  the  man  who  had  offered  him  this  posi 
tion,  but  I  knew  that  there  must  be  an  inter 
mediary.  While  I  continued  to  question  him  he 
opened  the  door  of  one  of  the  rooms  in  the  right 
wing,  hoping,  I  suppose,  to  distract  my  attention. 
We  went  on  with  our  discussion  there.  And  at 
last  I  refused  pointblank  to  have  anything  to  do 
with  the  affair,  and  told  him  that  I  was  going  to 
leave  him  and  go  back  to  the  profession  that 
would  afford  me  an  honest  living.  This  in 
furiated  him.  He  lost  all  self-control  and  con 
fessed  then,  what  I  had  already  begun  to  suspect, 
that  young  Kenwick  was  a  mental  patient  and 
had  been  in  no  way  consulted  in  the  arrangement. 
This  disclosure  terrified  me,  for  I  knew  that  my 
husband  was  not  a  competent  person  for  such  a 
responsibility.  Hot  words  followed  between  us, 


254  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

and  ended  in  his  knocking  me  senseless  on  the 
floor.  When  I  recovered  consciousness,  perhaps 
an  hour  later,  I  found  myself  locked  into  the  room 
with  no  possible  means  of  escape.  The  blow  had 
dislodged  a  vertebra  and  I  was  in  horrible  pain. 
For  a  long  time  I  lay  on  the  bed  massaging  the 
injured  place  and  trying  to  get  comfortable. 

"Early  in  the  evening  I  heard  some  one  being 
dragged  into  the  house  from  the  rear.  I  was 
unable  to  see  anything,  of  course,  but  I  could  dis 
tinctly  hear  footsteps  and  the  subsequent  running 
around  of  an  attendant.  I  concluded  that  my 
husband  had  returned  drunk,  and  I  was  relieved 
to  know  that  he  had  evidently  not  brought  the 
patient  with  him.  I  knew  that  I  had  no  recourse 
but  to  wait  until  the  stupor  had  worn  off  and  my 
husband  came  to  release  me.  I  spent  a  wakeful 
and  wretched  night.  In  the  morning " 

Here  a  vivid  and  convincing  description  of  her 
first  encounter  with  the  patient  ensued.  She  drew 
a  clear-cut  picture  of  her  own  horror  in  hearing 
footsteps  outside  her  door  and  of  having  the  name 
"Roger  Ken  wick"  called  in  through  the  closed 
portal ;  of  her  terror  at  finding  herself  unaccount 
ably  alone  with  a  man  whom  she  believed  to  be 
a  violent  maniac. 

Here  Dayton  held  up  the  narrative.     "What 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  255 

evidence  did  he  give  to  convince  you  of  his  in 
sanity?" 

"None  at  first.  He  seemed  to  talk  quite  ration 
ally,  and  fearing  that  I  might  make  him  angry  if 
I  kept  silence,  I  made  evasive  answers  to  his  ques 
tions.  He  prepared  food  and  sent  it  up  to  me  at 
what  I  know  now  must  have  been  immense  physi 
cal  cost  to  himself.  I  had  come  to  the  conclusion 
that  he,  like  myself,  was  the  victim  of  some  foul 
conspiracy  and  had  decided  to  risk  confiding  in 
him  when  all  at  once  his  manner  changed.  He 
began  to  talk  wildly  of  finding  a  loaded  revolver 
and  of  shooting  any  one  who  came  near  the  place. 
A  few  minutes  later,  for  no  apparent  reason,  I 
heard  him  smash  a  window  in  the  room  just 
under  mine.  My  terror  increased  a  hundredfold, 
for  I  know  absolutely  nothing  about  the  proper 
care  of  the  insane.  Late  that  same  night  I  heard 
him  crawl  out  through  the  broken  window,  and 
he  called  up  to  me  that  he  was  either  going  to 
get  help  or  commit  suicide. 

"Almost  insane  myself  now  with  terror,  I 
waited  until  I  heard  his  footsteps  grow  faint  in 
the  distance,  then  worked  at  the  lock  of  my  door, 
and  at  last  succeeded  in  picking  it  with  a  pen 
knife.  Then  I  rushed  downstairs,  turned  on  the 
lights,  and  tried  to  make  my  escape.  I  had  sev- 


256  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

eral  of  my  own  personal  keys  in  my  possession, 
and  with  one  of  these  I  opened  the  front  door, 
which  had  been  securely  locked,  I  suppose  by  the 
gardener.  My  one  frantic  object  was  to  get  away 
and  find  my  husband. 

"But  just  as  I  got  the  door  open  I  heard  a 
shot  fired  from  the  side  of  the  house.  I  hurried 
around  there,  and  when  I  reached  the  spot  from 
which  the  sound  had  come,  I  found  just  what 
I  feared — a  man  lying  dead  under  the  window. 
I  thought,  of  course,  that  it  was  the  patient  who 
had  killed  himself  in  a  mania,  as  he  had  threat 
ened  to  do.  Filled  with  horror  at  the  idea  of 
leaving  him  there  alone  and  uncovered  in  the 
storm,  I  ran  back  to  the  living-room,  picked  up 
the  first  thing  at  hand  (an  Indian  blanket),  and 
threw  it  over  him.  Then  I  hurried  to  the  nearest 
house,  about  a  mile  away,  and  gave  the  alarm. 

"Believing  that  it  was  my  husband's  neglect 
that  had  caused  the  tragedy,  my  purpose  was  to 
find  him  and  get  his  version  of  the  story  before 
I  betrayed  him.  So  I  furnished  no  further  in 
formation  to  the  authorities  in  town  save  that 
Roger  Kenwick,  the  inmate  of  Rest  Hollow,  had 
committed  suicide.  I  really  knew  nothing  else 
about  it  but  that  bare  fact. 

"But  that  night  I  discovered,  when  I  reached 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  257 

Mont-Mer,  that  my  husband  had  been  killed  in 
an  auto  accident  while  coming  out  from  the  depot. 
I  went  to  the  morgue  and  identified  his  body, 
ordered  the  remains  to  be  shipped  north  for  in 
terment,  and  left,  unknown  to  any  one,  on  the 
late  northbound  train.  The  undertaker  told  me 
that  there  had  been  no  other  victim  of  the 
tragedy,  so  I  reasoned  that  the  story  which  Mr. 
Kenwick  had  told  me  about  a  sprained  leg  was 
true,  after  all,  that  he  had  been  injured  in  the 
catastrophe  and  had,  by  a  curious  freak  of  chance, 
found  his  way  back  alone  to  the  very  place  that 
was  awaiting  him  and  in  which  he  had  been  living 
for  the  preceding  ten  months." 

Dayton  declared  himself  satisfied  with  the  tes 
timony  and  turned  the  witness  over  to  the  prose 
cution.  The  district  attorney  had  recovered  his 
interest.  "Mrs.  Marstan,"  he  said,  groping  for 
his  glasses,  "can  you  produce  a  certificate  of 
marriage  to  Dr.  Marstan?" 

"I  cannot.  Important  papers,  including  that, 
were  among  the  few  things  that  I  took  to  Rest 
Hollow  in  November,  and  you  have  been  in 
formed  that  the  place  is  completely  destroyed." 

"That  will  do." 

She  stepped  down  from  the  stand,  and  for  the 
first  time  her  eyes  rested  upon  the  prisoner.  In 


258  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

them  was  an  expression  that  would  have  given 
him  new  courage  had  he  seen  it,  but  Roger  Ken- 
wick  sat  motionless  as  a  statue,  his  gaze  fixed  im 
mutably  upon  the  floor.  It  was  only  when  the 
name  of  the  next  witness  was  called  that  he  came 
back  to  a  sense  of  his  surroundings.  "Call  Gran- 
ville  Jarvis." 

Dayton  surveyed  the  Southerner  sharply  before 
he  put  his  first  question.  "You  are  the  detective 
whom  Richard  Glover  employed  in  San  Fran 
cisco  to  shadow  the  prisoner'?" 

"I  am." 

"How  long  were  you  in  Mr.  Glover's  employ*?" 

"About  two  weeks." 

"Two  weeks?  Why  did  you  give  up  the  case 
then?" 

"Because  at  the  end  of  that  time  I  was  con 
vinced  that  Roger  Kenwick  was  neither  mentally 
unbalanced  nor  guilty  of  any  crime.  I  communi 
cated  this  opinion  to  Mr.  Glover  and  resigned 
from  further  service." 

"But  you  still  continued  to  shadow  the  pris 
oner?" 

"I  still  continued  to  cultivate  his  acquaintance. 
I  considered  him  one  of  the  most  interesting  men 
I  had  ever  met." 

"And  your  connections  with  him  since  then 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  259 

have  been  of  a  purely  friendly  character'?  Not  in 
any  way  professional,  Mr.  Jarvis  *?" 

"No,  I  can't  say  that.  For  a  few  weeks  after 
I  had  resigned  from  Mr.  Glover's  service  I  was 
asked  to  take  up  the  case  again  from  a  different 
angle;  employed,  I  may  say,  by  some  one  else." 

"By  whom?' 

For  just  an  instant  the  witness  hesitated. 
Then,  "By  Mr.  Clinton  Morgan." 

"Describe  that  incident,  please." 

Jarvis  clasped  his  hands  behind  his  head  and 
stared  off  into  space.  "It  was  near  the  end  of 
December  that  Professor  Morgan  came  to  my 
rooms  one  evening  and  asked  my  assistance  on 
the  case  of  Richard  Glover." 

For  the  first  time  since  the  beginning  of  the 
trial,  the  chief  witness  for  the  prosecution  be 
trayed  an  unguarded  emotion.  The  narrow  slit 
of  amber,  showing  between  his  drooping  lids, 
widened. 

"My  caller,"  Jarvis  went  on,  "explained  to 
me  that  he  and  his  sister,  who  were  friends  of 
Roger  Kenwick,  had  stumbled  upon  a  clue  the 
previous  day  that  had  made  them  suspect  that 
there  was  foul  play  about  his  death;  that  per 
haps  he  might  even  be  alive  after  all,  and  a  base 
advantage  taken  of  his  helplessness." 


260  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Here  Dayton  interjected  a  question.  "Was 
there  any  special  reason  why  Professor  Morgan 
should  have  chanced  upon  you  as  the  detective 
for  this  investigation*?  Had  you  had  any  previous 
connection  with  him?" 

"Only  an  academic  connection.  He  knew, 
through  university  affiliations,  that  I  was  out 
here  on  the  coast  doing  some  research  work  for 
Columbia  in  my  chosen  profession — criminal 
psychology." 

"Then  you  are  not  a  detective?" 

"Not  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word.  The 
finding  out  of  a  criminal  is  only  the  introductory 
part  of  my  interest." 

"Proceed  with  your  story,  Mr.  Jarvis." 

"Well,  Professor  Morgan  and  I  had  lunched 
together  several  times  over  at  the  Faculty  Club 
on  the  campus,  so  I  was  not  greatly  surprised  to 
receive  a  call  from  him.  Furthermore,  having 
heard  the  other  side  of  this  case,  I  was  much  in 
terested  in  the  opportunity  to  study  it  from  a 
new  angle.  For  while  I  was  in  Mr.  Glover's 
employ,  I  had,  unsuspected  by  Kenwick  himself, 
subjected  him  to  a  variety  of  exacting  psychologi 
cal  tests.  Under  the  pretext  of  making  some 
photographic  experiments  in  which  I  was  at  that 
time  interested,  I  had  enlisted  his  aid  on  several 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  261 

occasions  and  in  this  way  had  made  a  rather 
thorough  examination  of  his  five  senses,  his  power 
of  association,  his  memory  (both  for  retentiveness 
and  recall),  and  had  tried  him  out,  by  means  of 
various  athletic  games,  for  muscular  coordination, 
endurance,  poise,  and  many  other  essentials  of 
normality.  In  only  one  of  these  did  I  find  him 
defective.  And  that  one  was  memory. 

"My  research  was  made  the  more  interesting 
by  the  fact  that  shortly  after  I  undertook  the 
work  for  Mr.  Glover  the  subject  gave  me,  vol 
untarily  and  quite  unsuspectingly,  the  complete 
story  of  his  strange  adventure  at  Rest  Hollow, 
an  adventure  for  which  he  frankly  confessed  that 
he  could  not  account.  It  coincided  exactly  with 
the  hypothesis  which  I  had  established  for  him; 
that  he  had  at  one  period  of  his  life  been  mentally 
unbalanced,  and  that  he  had  in  some  way  re 
gained  his  sanity  but  not  completely  his  memory. 
When  I  knew  that  there  was  likely  to  be  a  crime 
attributed  to  him  (for  Mr.  Glover  had  hinted  as 
much)  my  interest  doubled.  For  Mr.  Kenwick 
had  on  various  occasions  shown  himself  possessed 
of  the  highest  ideals  and  a  fineness  of  caliber 
which  I  have  not  often  encountered.  And  so,  in 
the  employ  of  Professor  Morgan,  I  shifted  the 
focal  point  and  turned  the  search-light  of  science 


262  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

upon  the  accuser.  It  has  resulted  in  the  most 
startling  revelations." 

There  was  an  inarticulate  stir  in  the  crowded 
room.  From  the  rear  seats  men  and  women 
strained  forward  to  catch  every  word  as  it  fell, 
clear-cut  and  decisive,  from  the  scientist's  lips. 
Jarvis  sat  with  one  hand  thrust  into  his  pocket, 
and  his  keen  eyes  fixed  upon  the  group  of  lawyers 
below.  A  casual  observer  of  the  scene  might 
easily  have  mistaken  his  position  and  assigned  to 
him  the  role  of  prosecuting  attorney. 

"There  was  an  insurmountable  barrier,  of 
course,"  he  continued,  "to  my  making  any  per 
sonal  examination  of  Mr.  Glover,  as  I  had  done 
with  the  former  subject.  One  man  was  innocent 
and  unsuspecting;  the  other,  I  felt  certain,  would 
be  on  his  guard.  And  he  was.  Since  I  left  his 
service,  Richard  Glover  has  avoided  me.  So  a 
more  indirect  means  of  accomplishing  my  task 
had  to  be  devised.  After  some  consideration  I 
decided  to  enlist  the  aid  of  an  ally  whom  I  knew 
to  be  both  clever  and  discreet." 

A  long-drawn  sigh  swept  the  court-room.  It 
was  that  sigh,  a  mixture  of  eagerness  and  satis 
faction  by  means  of  which  an  audience  at  a 
theater  indicates  to  the  actors  that  the  perform 
ance  is  living  up  to  its  advertisements. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  263 

"Mr.  Kenwick  himself,"  the  witness  went  on 
in  his  calm,  even  voice,  "had  called  my  attention 
to  a  certain  Madame  Rosalie,  a  spiritualistic 
medium,  who  was  taking  the  city  by  storm.  He 
had  interviewed  her  for  his  paper,  and  from  his 
description  I  imagined  that  she  might  be  able  and 
willing  to  assist  me.  So  I  went  to  see  her,  and 
at  the  first  mention  of  Mr.  Kenwick' s  name  she 
became  intensely  interested." 

Here  Dayton's  voice,  sounding  a  curious  little 
note  of  exultation,  broke  in  again.  "You  have 
referred  to  this  medium  as  'Madame  Rosalie.' 
Was  that  her  professional  or  her  real  name?' 

"Her  professional  name.  Her  real  name,  as 
she  disclosed  it  to  me  on  the  occasion  of  my  first 
call,  was  Madeleine  Marstan." 

Another  moment  of  silence  and  then  the  wit 
ness  proceeded.  "Having  told  me  her  real  name, 
she  went  on  to  describe  her  unexpected  encounter, 
a  few  days  previously,  with  Roger  Kenwick,  who 
she  had  thought  was  dead.  It  seemed  that  when 
Kenwick  had  come  to  her  for  a  sitting,  his  name 
had  been  accidentally  revealed  to  her  by  another 
client,  and  it  had  struck  her  with  the  force  of  a 
blow.  For  it  recalled  to  her  mind  a  horrible 
adventure  at  Mont-Mer,  which  she  narrated  for 
me  then  in  detail.  At  first  she  had  surmised  that 


264  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

this  must  be  some  relative  of  the  unfortunate 
young  man,  and  she  had  done  all  she  could,  she 
said,  to  start  him  upon  the  track  of  the  tragedy. 
When  she  discovered  that  it  was  the  man  himself, 
she  was  glad  to  place  all  her  powers  at  my  dis 
posal.  For  she  had  returned  to  the  city  in  No 
vember  with  two  dominating  purposes;  first  to 
find  some  employment  which  would  bring  in 
quick  money  and  so  pay  her  husband's  debts  and 
clear  his  name,  and  second  to  discover,  if  pos 
sible,  the  identity  of  the  man  who  had  led  them 
both  into  the  miserable  Mont-Mer  trap,  which 
resulted  so  disastrously  for  every  one  concerned 
in  it.  She  had  not  been  able  to  make  a  stage 
contract,  she  said,  for  the  season  was  too  far 
advanced,  and  so  she  had  turned  to  the  occult,  in 
which  she  had  always  felt  a  deep  interest,  and 
for  which  she  knew  herself  to  have  an  unaccount 
able  talent.  Fortunately  her  strange  psychic 
ability  had  caught  the  attention  of  one  of  the 
university  faculty  and  she  had  been  given  just 
the  publicity  which  she  needed. 

"And  so  we  deliberately  plotted  between  us 
the  scientific  testing  of  Richard  Glover.  I  pre 
pared  a  list  of  apparently  random  words  in  which 
were  mingled  what  I  call  'dangerous  terms' ;  that 
is,  words  which  were  connected  with  the  adven- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  265 

ture  at  Rest  Hollow.  When  these  and  the  other 
tests  were  ready,  I  induced  Glover,  by  means  of 
a  casual  suggestion  from  a  mutual  acquaintance, 
to  seek  the  aid  of  'Madame  Rosalie.'  I  felt  cer 
tain  that  if  he  were  not  intimately  connected 
with  the  tragedy  he  would  scorn  this  idea,  and 
that  if  he  were,  it  was  exactly  the  time  that  he 
would  turn  to  the  supernatural  for  aid.  And  I 
was  not  mistaken.  For  almost  immediately  he 
called  upon  the  clairvoyant.  And  his  response 
to  the  tests  for  association  was  amazing  even  to 

me.    If  I  may  quote  from  the  list  of  words " 

He  drew  a  folded  paper  from  his  pocket. 
"Among  many  perfectly  irrelevant  terms  I  had 
smuggled  in  such  words  as  'blanket'  and  'win 
dow'  and  'oleander.'  Madame  Rosalie  reported 
that  his  gaze  always  returned  to  such  sugges 
tive  words  (despite  her  admonition  to  look  at 
something  else)  before  she  could  change  the  card. 
The  subconscious  response  to  evil  association  was 
almost  perfect.  There  were  many  other  tests,  of 
course,  and  by  the  time  he  had  completed  them  he 
had  shown  an  intimate  knowledge  of  the  crime  at 
Rest  Hollow  and  an  uneasiness  from  which  any 
skilful  psychologist  could  take  his  starting-point. 
And  then,  as  a  culminating  incident,  he  supplied 
to  the  medium,  quite  of  his  own  accord,  the  name 


266  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

'Rest  Hollow,'  and  put  to  her  the  unexpected 
question,  'Where  is  Ralph  Regan?' 

"Having  been  thus  convinced  that  he  was  the 
man  we  sought,  Mrs.  Marstan  and  I  continued 
our  investigations  together.  She  went  out  with 
him,  upon  several  occasions,  and  once,  by  pre- 
arrangement,  accompanied  him  to  the  theater. 
On  the  same  evening  I  invited  Kenwick,  and,  all 
at  once,  called  his  attention  to  Glover.  The  re 
sponse  was  like  match  to  powder.  The  visual 
image  of  his  former  warden  restored,  in  large  de 
gree,  his  memory.  He  was  eager  to  reestablish 
the  connection.  Mrs.  Marstan  had  been  careful 
to  point  out  Kenwick  to  her  escort,  and  the  result 
was  just  what  we  had  foreseen.  It  was  he  who 
evaded  the  encounter,  supplying  a  pretext  upon 
which  he  and  Mrs.  Marstan  immediately  left  the 
theater. 

"But  Glover  now  suspected  that  he  was  en 
trapped.  He  had  already,  I  knew,  put  another 
detective  upon  Kenwick' s  track.  When  news  was 
published  of  Mrs.  Fanwell's  arrival  in  Mont- 
Mer,  and  the  subsequent  demand  to  have  the  dis 
appearance  of  her  brother  investigated,  he  de 
cided  that  his  only  course  was  to  act  at  once. 
Mrs.  Marstan,  aided  by  her  unmistakable  psychic 
ability,  had  advised  him  to  follow  his  third  plan, 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  267 

and  this  plan  was  to  have  Kenwick  convicted  of 
murder." 

"And  this  was  the  report  that  you  turned  over 
to  Professor  Morgan  at  the  end  of  your  investi 
gation?"  Dayton  inquired. 

"This  was  the  report.  I  was  working  on  it  with 
him  up  in  San  Francisco  until  late  last  night. 
We  almost  missed  the  train  trying  to  fit  together 
the  final  details.  But  I  think  the  story,  as  I  have 
given  it  to  you,  is  now  complete." 

"Now,  one  other  thing,  Mr.  Jarvis.  In  the 
first  part  of  your  testimony  you  said  that  Mr. 
Morgan  told  you  that  he  had  stumbled  upon  a 
clue  that  had  made  him  suspicious  of  Glover. 
Did  he  disclose  to  you  the  nature  of  that 
clue?" 

"Not  at  first.  I  told  him  that  I  preferred  to 
work  upon  some  theories  of  my  own,  unpreju 
diced  by  any  evidence  that  he  might  have  to 
offer."  ' 

"And  how  many  times  have  you  seen  Mr. 
Morgan  since  then?" 

"Only  once.  We  came  down  from  San  Fran 
cisco  together  last  night." 

"Then  you  made  no  reports  to  him  before?" 

For  the  first  time,  the  witness  hesitated.  Then 
his  reply  came  with  the  customary  clearness. 


268  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"Not  to  him.  I  have  reported  to  Miss  Morgan 
on  several  occasions." 

"Then  you  have  been  really  working  with  her 
upon  this  case4?" 

"Yes,  almost  entirely  with  her." 

There  was  a  very  obvious  reluctance  in  his 
voice  now,  but  Dayton  went  on  imperturbably. 
"When  you  came  down  from  San  Francisco  last 
night,  Mr.  Jarvis,  was  Professor  Morgan's  sister 
in  your  party?" 

"Yes." 

Dayton  swept  a  glance  over  the  rows  of  faces 
before  him.  "Is  Miss  Morgan  in  the  court-room 
now?" 

"She  has  just  come  in."  The  promptness  with 
which  the  witness  had  given  his  earlier  testimony 
served  to  make  his  present  reluctance  the  more 
apparent. 

Dayton  brought  his  eyes  back  to  the  witness- 
stand.  "That  will  do." 

Jarvis  stepped  down.  The  voice  of  the  audi 
tors,  beginning  in  a  subdued  murmur,  rose  in 
marked  crescendo.  No  word  in  it  could  be  dis 
tinguished  from  another.  Yet  upon  Roger  Ken- 
wick's  sensitive  nerves  this  message  from  the 
outer  world  registered.  It  was  unmistakably  ap 
plause. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  269 

For  the  first  time  since  the  trial  began,  he  felt 
his  mask  of  graven  indifference  slipping  from 
him.  He  was  trembling  in  every  fiber,  and  with 
one  unsteady  hand  he  made  a  pathetic  effort  to 
quiet  the  other.  And  then  there  fell  upon  his 
ears  like  the  crash  of  thunder  Dayton's  curt  com 
mand,  "Call  Miss  Morgan." 


CHAPTER  XIX 

AS  the  men  standing  in  the  far  aisle  made  way 
for  the  new  witness,  Kenwick  sat  with 
averted  eyes.  Through  the  open  window  he 
stared  out  at  the  court-house  palms  which  grew 
to  gigantic  size  and  then  diminished  under  his 
blistering  gaze.  It  was  a  monstrous  thing,  he 
told  himself,  for  Clinton  Morgan  to  allow  this; 
to  permit  his  sister  to  subject  herself  to  such  a 
strain.  What  could  he  be  thinking  about?  But 
underneath  his  miserable  apprehension  for  her 
there  was  something  else ;  something  else  that  sent 
the  fiery  blood  rioting  through  his  veins.  For  she 
must  have  been  willing.  Over  and  over  he  re 
peated  to  himself  this  assurance.  She  must  have 
been  willing  to  come  to  his  defense,  for  had  she 
not  been,  they  could  have  found  a  way  to  avoid  it. 
Marcreta  Morgan,  in  long  fur-trimmed  motor- 
coat  and  dark  veil,  took  the  place  which  Granville 
Jarvis  had  vacated.  She  had  none  of  Madeleine 
Marstan's  calm  self-assurance,  but  although  she 
gave  her  testimony  in  a  low  voice,  it  was  dis 
tinctly  audible  throughout  the  court-room.  She 

270 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  271 

sat  with  one  gloved  hand  clasping  the  arm  of  the 
chair  and  her  eyes  resting  upon  Dayton.  Only 
once,  at  the  very  end  of  the  examination,  did  she 
raise  them  to  meet  the  argus-eyed  spectators. 
Dayton  put  his  questions  in  an  easy  conversational 
tone  as  though  he  and  the  witness  were  alone  in 
the  room. 

"Miss  Morgan,  how  long  have  you  known  the 
prisoner?" 

"About  two  years." 

"Describe  the  occasion  of  your  first  meeting." 

She  did  so  in  words  that  sounded  carefully 
rehearsed. 

"And  after  he  left  San  Francisco  to  go  East 
and  visit  his  brother  did  you  ever  hear  from 
him?" 

"Yes.  He  wrote  frequently,  telling  me  about 
his  brother's  recovery  from  illness  and  other 
affairs,  and  then  later  that  he  had  decided  to 
enlist  in  the  army." 

"At  that  time,  Miss  Morgan,  had  you  ever 
known  the  State's  witness  here,  Richard  Glover?" 

"It  was  about  that  time  that  I  first  met  him." 

"Describe  your  first  encounter  with  him." 

Again  the  carefully  prepared  report.  But  she 
was  gaining  in  self-possession  now,  and  the  veil 
seemed  to  annoy  her.  With  steady  fingers  she 


272  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

reached  up  and  removed  it.  Clinton  Morgan, 
watching  her  from  the  front  row  of  seats,  with  a 
hawklike  vigilance,  was  suddenly  reminded  of 
that  Sunday  night  in  the  old  library  when  she 
had  first  broken  her  long  silence  concerning  Roger 
Kenwick,  and  had  seemed  all  at  once  to  come  into 
a  belated  heritage. 

The  jurymen  were  leaning  slightly  forward  in 
their  seats,  their  eyes  fixed  upon  the  regal,  fur- 
coated  figure  with  delicately  flushed  profile  show 
ing  clear-cut  as  a  cameo  against  the  frosted 
window-pane.  Dayton  thought  that  he  caught 
an  elusive  fragrance  that  reminded  him  of  some 
thing  growing  in  his  mother's  garden. 

"And  how  many  times,"  he  proceeded,  "how 
many  times  have  you  seen  Richard  Glover  during 
the  past  year*?" 

"I  can't  say  exactly.  For  several  months  after 
our  first  meeting  I  did  n't  see  him  at  all.  But 
during  the  last  three  months  his  calls  have  been 
more  and  more  frequent." 

"Has  your  brother  known  of  these  visits'?" 

"My  brother  was  in  government  service  in 
Washington  until  about  two  months  ago.  He 
did  n't  know  of  them  until  he  returned." 

"And  has  he  approved  of  them?" 

"No,  I  can't  say  that  he  has." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  273 

"Did  he  ever  give  any  reason  for  his  opposi 
tion?" 

"He  told  me  that  he  suspected  Mr.  Glover  of 
being  an  adventurer  who  was  in  need  of " 

Here  the  district  attorney  interrupted.  "We 
object.  The  suspicions  of  another  person  are 
irrelevant,  incompetent,  and  have  nothing  to  do 
with  the  case." 

"Sustained,"  the  judge  decreed.  "Stick  to  the 
facts,  Mr.  Dayton." 

"During  those  three  months,  Miss  Morgan,  has 
Richard  Glover  made  an  effort  to  induce  you  to 
marry  him*?" 

Her  reply  was  given  in  a  very  low  voice,  but 
Dayton  was  sure  that  the  jury  caught  it  and  he 
did  not  ask  her  to  repeat.  It  was  evident  that 
the  audience  heard  it,  too,  for  another  murmur 
rose  and  trailed  off  into  silence  before  the  lawyer 
went  on.  "Is  it  true  that  you  were  the  one  who 
discovered  the  clue  which  led  you  and  your 
brother  to  seek  the  services  of  Mr.  Jarvis  on  this 
case?' 

She  acknowledged  it  with  a  single  word. 

"And  what  was  that  clue?" 

The  gloved  fingers  closed  a  little  closer  over 
the  arm  of  the  chair.  And  then  followed  a  story 
which  caused  Roger  Kenwick  to  tear  his  gaze 


274  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

away  from  the  fantastic  palm-trees  and  fix  it 
upon  Richard  Glover's  face.  There  was  no  re 
sentment  in  his  eyes,  but  only  the  dawning  of  a 
great  light.  Granville  Jarvis,  watching  him  as 
a  physician  might  watch  beside  the  bedside  of  an 
unconscious  patient,  knew  by  the  leaping  flame 
in  those  somber  eyes  that  the  last  lap  of  the  long 
journey  had  been  covered,  and  that  Roger  Ken- 
wick's  memory  had  come  home  to  him.  But  if 
that  knowledge  brought  him  a  scientist's  satis 
faction,  he  gave  no  sign  of  it.  After  that  one 
intent  moment,  his  eyes  returned  to  the  witness- 
stand  and  fixed  themselves  upon  Marcreta  Mor 
gan's  face.  Dayton  was  proceeding  relentlessly. 

"If  you  knew  from  the  first  that  Richard 
Glover  had  stolen  this  story  which  he  read  to  you 
as  his  own,  why  did  n't  you  relate  the  circum 
stance  to  Mr.  Kenwick  when  you  saw  him  on  the 
night  that  he  was  arrested  for  murder?" 

The  reply  came  haltingly,  as  though  the  wit 
ness  were  feeling  her  way  over  uneven  ground. 
"My  brother  and  I  had  consulted  Mr.  Jarvis 
about  that  and  he  had  advised  against  it.  He 
did  n't  wish  to  arouse  any  suspicions  in — in  the 
prisoner's  mind  just  then.  And — well,  you  see, 
Mr.  Kenwick  and  I  had  not  seen  each  other  since 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  275 

his — illness  and  during  that  first  meeting  we  both 
avoided  everything  connected  with — with  the 
tragedy  as  much  as  possible.  Of  course  if  we  had 
known  that  this  charge  of — of  crime  was  to  be 
preferred  against  him,  I  suppose  we  would  have 
acted  differently." 

This  was  no  carefully  rehearsed  response,  but 
nothing  that  she  could  have  said  would  have  dis 
closed  more  clearly  the  inside  workings  of  the 
opposition's  conspiracy.  The  web  that  had  been 
woven  around  the  prisoner  had  enmeshed  with 
him  every  one  who  had  ever  been  intimately  as 
sociated  with  his  past. 

And  now  that  romance  had  entered  upon  the 
sordid  scene  the  whole  aspect  of  the  case  was 
changed.  The  air  became  charged  all  at  once 
with  an  electric  current  of  sympathy.  To  every 
man  and  woman  in  the  room  Richard  Glover  now 
appeared  in  the  guise  of  a  baffled  adventurer,  and 
Roger  Kenwick  as  a  man  who  had  loved,  and 
because  of  cruel  circumstance  had  lost.  But  had 
he  really  lost?  The  crux  of  public  interest 
shifted  with  the  abruptness  of  a  weathercock, 
from  mystery  to  romance. 

"You  assert,  Miss  Morgan,  that  you  knew  this 
story,  'A  Brother  of  Bluebeard/  to  be  the  one 


276  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

which  the  prisoner  had  read  to  you  before  he  left 
for  the  East  almost  two  years  ago.  What  proof 
could  you  furnish  of  this?" 

"At  the  time  that  Mr.  Glover  read  the  story  to 
me  I  had  in  my  possession  the  sequel  to  it,  which 
Mr.  Kenwick  had  sent  me  in  manuscript  for  my 
criticism,  just  before  he  left  for  training-camp. 
It  used  many  of  the  same  characters  and  was 
rooted  in  the  same  plot." 

"Could  you  produce  that  manuscript?" 

"Mr.  Jarvis  can  produce  it.  I  turned  it  over 
to  him." 

The  former  witness  leaned  forward  and  laid 
a  heap  of  pencil-written  manuscript  upon  the 
table.  But  Dayton  scarcely  glanced  at  it.  With 
one  hand  he  pushed  it  aside,  and  then  shifted  the 
current  of  his  interest  into  another  channel. 
"When,  and  by  what  means,  Miss  Morgan,  did 
you  discover  that  Roger  Kenwick  had  returned 
from  France  mentally  disabled?" 

Her  reply  to  this  question  came  in  a  voice  that 
was  struggling  against  heavy  odds  for  composure. 
"It  was  exactly  one  year  ago  to-day  that  I  re 
ceived  that  news.  Several  letters  of  mine  to — 
the  prisoner  were  returned  to  me  unopened.  And 
with  them  came  a  communication  from  Mr. 
Everett  Kenwick  telling  me  that — that  it  had 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  277 

become  necessary  for  them  to  send  his  brother  to 
a  private  asylum." 

"Did  you  know  where  that  asylum  was?" 

"Not  then.  He  told  me  that  he  was  debating 
over  several  different  places  but  that  he  had  al 
most  decided  upon  a  friend's  home  in  southern 
California.  He  did  n't  tell  me  where  this  home 
was.  I  think  he  realized  that — that  I  would 
rather  not  know." 

"And  when  did  you  discover  that  that  place 
was  Mont-Mer?' 

"On  the  night  that  Mr.  Ken  wick  was  reported 
dead." 

A  murmur  that  was  distinctly  a  wave  of  sym 
pathy  filled  the  chamber.  But  eagerness  to  catch 
the  next  question  quieted  it. 

"After  that  first  letter  telling  you  about  the 
prisoner's  misfortune,  did  you  ever  hear  from  Mr. 
Everett  Kenwick  again4?" 

"Only  once.  Just  a  week  before  he  died,  he 
wrote  again.  He  had  just  lost  his  wife  and  he 
seemed  to  have  a  premonition  that  he  was  not 
going  to  live  very  long." 

She  was  feeling  for  her  handkerchief  in  the 
pocket  of  the  fur-trimmed  coat.  Some  of  the 
men  in  the  court-room  averted  their  eyes.  The 
face  of  more  than  one  woman  softened.  Clinton 


278  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Morgan  sat  regarding  his  sister  with  a  curious 
composure.  In  his  eyes  was  that  mixture  of  com 
passion  and  awe  that  he  had  worn  on  the  night 
when  the  gold  and  ivory  book  had  betrayed  to 
him  her  secret. 

"Yes?"  Dayton  went  on  gently,  but  with  the 
same  relentless  persistence.  "He  wrote  to  you 
again*?  And  what  did  he  say?" 

"He  said  that  he  wanted  me  to  have  something 
that  had  belonged — to  his  brother.  He  told  me 
that  he  felt  that  Roger  Kenwick  would  have 
wished  me  to  have  it.  And  with  the  letter  there 
came  a  box  in  which  I  found " 

She  had  finished  her  search  in  the  pocket  of  the 
motor-coat,  and  now  she  held  something  between 
her  gloved  fingers.  "Mr.  Everett  Kenwick  him 
self  had  only  received  it  a  short  time  before. 
There  had  been  some  delay  and  confusion  about 
it,  owing  I  suppose  to  his  brother  having  been 
sent  home — in  just  the  way  that  he  was.  He 
himself  never  knew  that  he  had  won  it.  Rut  it 

was  such  a  wonderful  display  of  courage 

And  the  French  officer  whose  life  he  had  saved 
sent  a  letter,  too,  saying  that  France  was  grateful 
and  wanted  to  express  her  appreciation  in  some 
way  so " 

And  then  she  held  it  up  before  them;  before 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  279 

the  lawyers  and  the  jury  and  the  crowd  of  spec 
tators — a  bit  of  metal  on  its  patch  of  ribbon. 
Holding  it  out  before  them,  she  sat  there  like  a 
sovereign  waiting  to  confer  a  peerage.  And  not 
the  judge's  gavel  nor  the  commanding  voice  of 
the  district  attorney  could  still  the  tumult  that 
rose  and  swelled  into  tumultuous  applause. 

On  the  day  following  the  notorious  Kenwick 
murder  trial,  the  Mont-Mer  papers  carried  little 
other  news.  A  special  representative  from  the 
"San  Francisco  Clarion"  and  several  Los  Angeles 
journalists  fed  their  copy  over  the  wires  and  had 
extras  out  in  both  cities  by  eight  o'clock. 

"Kenwick  Acquitted"  was  the  head-line  which 
his  own  paper  ran,  with  his  picture  and  one  of 
Richard  Glover  sharing  prominence  upon  the 
front  page.  And  because  of  Ken  wick's  previous 
connection  with  this  daily  and  the  fact  that  the 
two  star  witnesses  for  the  defense  were  well 
known  in  the  Bay  region,  the  "Clarion's"  story 
was  the  most  comprehensive  and  colorful. 

It  opened  with  a  report  of  Dayton's  speech 
which,  it  appeared,  had  electrified  every  one  in 
the  court-room,  including  the  prisoner  himself. 
But  it  had  been  unnecessary  for  the  attorney  to 
make  a  plea  for  his  client,  after  the  quietly  dra- 


280  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

matic  testimony  of  the  last  witness  for  the  de 
fense.  In  thrilling  terms  the  "Clarion"  described 
Kenwick's  final  service  at  the  front,  when  he  had 
made  his  way  alone  across  No-Man'  s-Land  and 
saved  for  France  one  of  her  most  gallant  officers, 
and  had  given  in  exchange  that  thing  which  is 
more  precious  than  life  itself.  Only  through  an 
accident,  which  had  killed  the  man  who  had 
meant  to  batten  upon  his  misery,  had  he  been 
released  from  a  pitiable  bondage. 

Having  thus  sketched  in  his  "human  interest," 
the  reporter  proceeded  to  tell  the  story  which  had 
proved  so  overwhelmingly  convincing  to  the  jury 
and  audience.  How,  in  his  skilfully  planned 
narrative,  Richard  Glover  had  transposed  the 
identities  of  the  two  dead  men.  How,  upon  re 
ceiving  his  commission  from  Everett  Kenwick,  he 
had  first  turned  over  his  charge  to  Ralph  Regan, 
admitted  by  his  own  sister  to  be  an  addict  to 
drugs  and  a  ne'er-do-well  whom  she  was  helping, 
in  a  surreptitious  way,  to  support.  How  the 
accounts,  forwarded  from  the  Kenwick  lawyer  in 
New  York,  showed  that  Regan  must  have  re 
ceived  out  of  the  arrangement  only  his  living  and 
enough  of  the  drug  to  keep  him  satisfied  but  not 
wholly  irresponsible.  How,  upon  his  own  in 
frequent  visits  to  the  patient  (whom  he  himself 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  281 

had  conducted  across  the  continent  instead  of  the 
mythical  Bailey)  Glover  had  foreseen  two 
months  before  the  tragedy  that  Regan  could  no 
longer  be  relied  upon  and  had  told  him  that  he 
was  about  to  be  dismissed. 

How  he  had  then  secured  the  services  of  one 
Edward  Marstan,  whom  he  believed  to  be  with 
out  family,  and  who  represented  himself  as  a 
physician  in  good  standing  but  heavily  in  debt. 
How  the  arrangement  had  been  made  that  he 
assume  charge  of  the  patient  at  the  Mont-Mer 
depot,  whither  Kenwick  was  to  be  brought  up 
from  a  day's  sojourn  in  Los  Angeles  by  Regan. 
How  the  physician,  accompanied  by  his  wife, 
had  arrived  from  San  Francisco  that  very  day; 
how  Marstan  had  quarreled  with  his  wife,  and 
leaving  her  unconscious  in  a  room  at  Rest  Hollow, 
had  gone  into  town  to  get  his  charge.  How,  on 
the  way  out  from  town  he  had  been  killed  in  an 
accident  while  driving  his  own  car,  and  how,  by 
a  curious  fate,  Kenwick  had  been  restored  to 
sanity  and  had  found  his  way  back  alone  to  his 
former  asylum. 

The  story  then  went  on  to  relate  how  Ralph 
Regan,  evidently  desperate  over  his  loss  of  a  home 
and  drug  supplies,  had  returned  to  Rest  Hollow 
by  stealth  the  following  night,  either  to  make  a 


282  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

plea  to  the  new  caretaker  or  to  search  for  drugs, 
and  of  how,  finding  the  house  dark  and  appar 
ently  deserted,  he  had  forsaken  all  hope  of  re 
instatement  and  had  ended  his  life  with  the  re 
volver  which  he  had  brought  either  for  murder  of 
Marstan  or  for  suicide.  The  shot  which  he  fired, 
the  paper  stated,  had  evidently  been  used  to  test 
his  own  nerve  or  the  cartridges;  and  it  had  done 
its  work.  Letters  written  to  his  sister  a  few 
weeks  before  the  tragedy,  and  produced  by  her 
in  court,  indicated  a  depression  amounting  to 
acute  melancholia. 

Recalled  to  the  witness-stand  and  subjected  to 
crucial  cross-examination,  the  gardener  at  Rest 
Hollow  had  broken  down  in  his  testimony,  ad 
mitted  that  he  was  afraid  of  Glover,  and  that 
although  he  had  been  in  too  dazed  a  condition 
on  the  fatal  night  to  examine  the  body  of  the 
dead  man,  he  knew  Ralph  Regan  to  have  been 
the  former  attendant  and  had  frequently  talked 
to  him  about  the  patient's  symptoms,  about  which 
Regan  appeared  to  know  little  and  care  less. 

The  narrative  then  went  on  to  tell  how  Richard 
Glover  had  discovered  among  the  possessions  of 
his  charge  certain  manuscripts  which  he  deemed 
suitable  for  publication,  and  how  he  had,  after 
the  death  of  the  elder  Kenwick,  sold  one  of  them 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  283 

under  the  name  of  Ralph  Regan,  choosing  a  real 
rather  than  a  fictitious  name  in  order  that  he 
might  shift  the  theft  to  helpless  shoulders  if  it 
were  ever  discovered.  How  he  had,  with  the 
Kenwick  capital  entrusted  to  him,  invested  in 
large  realty  holdings  which  had  completely  ab 
sorbed  his  attention.  How  he  had  padded  his 
accounts  in  order  to  wring  extra  money  from 
Everett  Kenwick  under  the  guise  of  "special 
treatments"  for  the  patient  and  so  on.  How  on 
the  night  of  the  fatality  he  had  driven  to  Rest 
Hollow  from  Los  Angeles  to  give  some  final  in 
structions  to  the  new  employee,  and  how,  stum 
bling  upon  the  dead  body  of  Regan,  he  had  been 
shocked  to  find  himself  involved  in  a  tragedy. 
How  he  had  then  cold-bloodedly  decided  to  have 
the  body  identified  as  Kenwick,  partly  to  save 
himself  from  the  charge  of  criminal  neglect  and 
partly  because  he  knew  that  Everett  Kenwick 
had  left  in  his  will  a  bequest  that  was  to  come 
to  him  "for  faithful  service"  upon  the  death  or 
recovery  of  his  brother.  How,  not  dreaming  that 
his  charge  would  ever  recover,  he  had  thus  used 
his  death  as  a  means  of  gaining  extra  funds  which 
he  badly  needed  just  at  that  time. 

How  he  had  accordingly  selected  certain  of 
the  patient's  personal  possessions  with  which  he 


284  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

had  been  entrusted,  to  4eceive  the  coroner.  How 
all  the  subsequent  action  had  seemed  to  play  into 
his  hands:  the  coroner's  easy  acquiescence  in  the 
suicide  theory  and  the  identity  of  the  body;  the 
chance  discovery,  through  Arnold  Rogers,  that 
the  story  of  Kenwick' s  self-destruction  had  al 
ready  been  accepted  by  the  community. 

How,  preceding  the  coroner's  inquest,  Glover 
had  spent  the  morning  tracing  the  antecedent 
action  of  the  tragedy  and  had  heard  of  the  acci 
dent  which  had  killed  Marstan.  How  he  had 
erred  in  suspecting  that  the  real  victim  of  the 
tragedy  was  Kenwick  and  that  the  attendant  had 
had  the  body  identified  as  his  own  and  then  made 
his  escape,  fearing  to  communicate  the  news  of 
the  disaster  to  his  employer.  How  he,  Glover, 
had  been  startled  to  discover  later  that  Kenwick 
was  not  only  alive  but  had  apparently  recovered 
his  mental  health. 

The  remainder  of  the  story  was  given  as  the 
testimony  of  Madeleine  Marstan,  well-known 
favorite  in  the  former  Alcazar  stock  company, 
and  Granville  Jarvis,  expert  psychologist,  whose 
skilful  work  was  a  strong  plea  for  the  admission 
of  that  newest  of  the  sciences  into  court-room 
procedure. 

During  this  latter  testimony,  the  "Clarion" 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  285 

asserted,  interest  had  been  divided  between  the 
ultimate  fate  of  the  accused  and  the  valuable 
contributions  which  the  laboratory  experiments 
of  the  witness  had  given  the  case.  The  word- 
tests  which  he  had  provided  to  the  medium  were, 
he  had  explained,  one  of  the  surest  means  of 
discovering  the  train  of  associations  which  lodge 
in  the  guilty  mind.  He  had  never  been  con 
vinced  that  Glover  himself  had  committed  a 
murder,  but  suspected  that  his  crime  lay  in  try 
ing  to  fasten  it  upon  a  man  whom  he  knew  to  be 
both  innocent  and  helpless.  The  cards,  contain 
ing  a  mixture  of  irrelevant  and  relevant  words, 
had  been  shown  him  and  then  he  had  been  in 
structed  to  turn  his  head  in  the  opposite  direction. 
These  instructions  he  had  carefully  observed  ex 
cept  in  the  cases  of  terms  which  held  evil  associa 
tions.  In  such  cases  his  eyes  almost  invariably 
turned  back  to  the  card  with  the  printed  word. 
Such  terms  as  "gravel"  and  "oleander"  had  pro 
duced  this  attraction.  But  they  had  also  aroused 
his  suspicions.  And  from  the  day  of  his  first  call 
upon  "Madame  Rosalie"  the  situation  between 
them  had  been  a  succession  of  clever  manceuvers. 
Neither  one  of  them  had  dared  to  let  the  other  go. 
But  in  this  encounter  Mrs.  Marstan  had  had  the 
advantage.  What  he  was  able  to  find  out  about 


286  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

her  was  little  compared  with  what  she  had  dis 
covered  concerning  him. 

That  she  possessed  unmistakable  psychic  pow 
ers  could  not  be  disputed.  By  a  means  of  com 
munication,  which  she  could  not  herself  explain, 
she  had  received  at  the  time  of  Roger  Ken  wick's 
interview  with  her  a  message  from  the  spirit  of 
Isabel  Kenwick,  confessing  that  it  was  she  who 
had  unwittingly  brought  Richard  Glover  into  his 
life,  and  entreating  his  forgiveness. 

As  to  the  concluding  story  of  the  actress,  it 
was  concerned  with  her  description  of  how  she 
had  identified  the  body  of  her  husband  at  the 
morgue  on  the  evening  of  her  flight  from  Rest 
Hollow;  of  how  she  had  turned  all  arrangements 
for  its  shipment  and  burial  over  to  the  Mont-Mer 
and  San  Francisco  undertakers,  desiring  to  figure 
as  little  as  possible  in  connection  with  the  death 
of  the  man  who  had  ruined  her  life.  Of  how  she 
had  succeeded  in  paying  the  debts  against  his 
name  and  had  recently  signed  a  stage  contract 
with  an  eastern  theatrical  company. 

When  the  trial  was  ended  the  crowd  that 
jammed  the  room  rose  and  surged  toward  the  man 
in  the  prisoner's  box,  like  a  human  tidal  wave. 
"Keep  them  back,  Dayton,"  Kenwick  implored. 
"I  don't  want  to  talk  to  them." 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  287 

Somehow  his  attorney  managed  to  check  the 
onrush,  and  the  throng  of  congratulatory  spec 
tators  was  headed  toward  the  exits.  The  room 
was  almost  empty  when  some  one  touched  the 
prisoner's  arm. 

"Can  you  give  me  a  few  words'?"  It  was  one 
of  the  local  reporters.  "You  're  a  newspaper 
man  yourself,  Mr.  Kenwick,  and  you  know  how 
it  is  about  these  things." 

Kenwick  shook  him  off.  "Come  around  later, 
to  the  hotel,  if  you  like,"  he  said,  and  turned  to 
take  a  hand  that  was  timidly  held  out  to  him. 

"I  did  n't  know  whether  you  'd  be  willing  to 
speak  to  me  or  not,  Mr.  Kenwick.  But  I  just 
wanted  to  tell  you  that  I  'm  satisfied,  more  than 
satisfied  with — the  way  it  has  all  come  out." 

"I  am  glad  to  hear  that,  Mrs.  Fanwell,"  Ken 
wick  told  her  gravely.  "I  would  never  have  been 
quite  satisfied  myself  unless  I  had  heard  you  say 
that.  I  wish  you  would  leave  your  address  with 
Dayton,  for,  you  see,  I  feel  a  little  bit  responsible 
for  you,  and  I  would  like  to  put  you  in  the  way 
of  getting  a  new  hold  on  life." 

The  only  other  person  in  the  room  with  whom 
he  stopped  to  talk  was  Madeleine  Marstan,  who 
stood  in  conversation  with  Dayton  near  the  door. 
To  her  his  words  of  thanks  were  the  more  elo- 


288  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

quent  perhaps  because  they  came  haltingly,  im 
peded  by  an  emotion  which  he  could  not  master. 

"It  was  nothing,"  she  told  him.  "Nothing 
that  I  did  n't  owe  you,  Mr.  Kenwick." 

"I  don't  see  that  you  owed  me  anything,"  he 
objected.  "As  the  affair  has  developed,  we  were 
both  the  victims  of  an  ugly  plot.  It  certainly 
was  not  your  fault.  And  once  out  of  that  ac 
cursed  house,  you  were  free." 

"Not  my  fault — no,"  she  repeated,  "but  my 
responsibility  afterward."  She  gazed  past  him 
out  of  the  window  where,  at  the  curb,  Arnold 
Rogers  was  assisting  a  fur-coated  figure  into  the 
Paddington  limousine.  "You  see,  Edward 

Marstan  was  my  husband  and Well,  some 

day  you  may  come  to  realize,  Mr.  Kenwick,  that 
when  a  woman  has  loved,  there  is  no  such  word 
as  'free.'  " 

At  the  foot  of  the  stairway  Kenwick  spoke 
with  an  almost  curt  suppression  to  Granville 
Jarvis.  "I'm  going  over  to  the  hotel  with 
Morgan.  Come  over  there." 

The  other  man  made  no  reply  save  a  slight  in 
clination  of  his  head,  and  there  was  in  his  eyes 
an  expression  which  haunted  and  mystified  the 
released  prisoner. 

"Jarvis  is  a  wizard,"  he  said  to  Clinton  Mor- 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  289 

gan  as  they  walked  the  few  short  blocks  to  Mont- 
Mer's  leading  hostelry.  "If  they  ever  let  down 
the  bars  of  the  court-room  to  men  like  that, 
they  '11  revolutionize  legal  procedure.  He  seems 
to  have  seen  this  case  from  every  angle." 

"From  more  angles  than  you  imagine,"  his 
friend  replied.  "And  he  had  let  me  in  on  some 
of  the  most  interesting  of  his  findings  that  were 
not  revealed  in  court.  For  instance,  he  examined 
that  gardener  this  morning,  just  for  his  own  satis 
faction.  The  boy  was  willing,  even  flattered  by 
the  attention.  Jarvis  told  me  afterward  that  a 
witness  like  that  ought  to  be  ruled  out  of  court. 
And  he  is  typical  of  the  mass  of  men  and  women 
who  assist  in  acquitting  the  guilty  and  sending 
the  innocent  to  the  gallows.  The  average  physi 
cian  examining  him  would  pronounce  him 
normal.  He  can  hear  a  sound  distinctly,  for 
instance,  but  he  is  afflicted  with  that  common 
defect,  the  equivalent,  Jarvis  says,  of  color 
blindness  in  the  visual  realm,  which  makes  it 
impossible  for  him  to  tell  whether  the  sound 
comes  from  behind  or  in  front  of  him.  And  he 
lacks  completely  a  visual  memory.  He  could 
recall  the  exact  words  that  GifTord  said  to  him 
on  the  night  of  the  suicide  but  he  could  n't  re 
member  whether  the  body  was  covered  or  un- 


2Qo  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

covered  when  he  saw  it.  And  as  for  the  tests  with 

Glover By  the  way,  what  are  you  going  to 

do  with  Glover?' 

"I  don't  know  yet.  I  have  n't  got  that  far.  I 
think  I  can  forgive  him  everything  except  that 
infamous  story  about  Everett  being  close  with 
me  while  I  was  under  age.  Why,  I  had  too  much 
money  while  I  was  in  college,  Morgan.  That 's 
the  chief  reason  why  I  did  n't  push  my  literary 
work  with  greater  zeal.  The  creative  tempera 
ment  is  naturally  indolent.  It  requires  a  spur, 
not  necessarily  a  financial  one,  but  so  much  the 
better  if  it  is.  Of  course  Glover  and  I  will  have 
to  have  a  financial  reckoning.  I  can  see  now  why 
my  frantic  messages  to  our  family  lawyer  were 
never  answered.  I  suppose  he  's  had  dozens  of 
communications  from  people  purporting  to  be 
connected  by  blood  or  marriage  with  the  Ken- 
wick  estate.  Yes,  Glover  has  got  some  things  to 

answer  to  me  for,  but "  His  mind  flew  back 

to  that  last  evening  that  he  had  spent  in  the  fire- 
lit  living-room  on  Pine  Street.  "He  brought  hell 
into  my  life  for  a  time,"  he  ended  slowly.  "But 
he  brought — something  else  into  it,  too." 

It  was  half  an  hour  later,  after  Kenwick  had 
bathed  and  dressed  for  dinner,  that  Granville 
Jarvis  came  up  to  his  room.  Kenwick  admitted 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  291 

him  with  an  inarticulate  word  of  greeting.  Then 
while  with  fumbling  fingers  he  put  on  a  fresh 
collar,  he  made  an  attempt  at  normal  conversa 
tion. 

"Been  expecting  you,"  he  said.  "Morgan  is 
down  in  the  lobby.  We  '11  all  have  dinner  here 
first  and  then " 

"Can't  do  it,"  Jarvis  cut  in.  "I  have  another 
engagement  for  dinner,  and  I  'm  leaving  town  on 
the  eight- forty  northbound.  I  just  ran  up  to  say 
good-by  and — good  luck." 

"Where  are  you  going  ?" 

Jarvis  smiled.  "To  Argentina,  so  far  as  you 
are  concerned.  But  you  can  call  it  Columbia  if 
you  like.  I  'm  returning  to  my  work  there.  You 
see,  I  Jve  been  away  on  leave." 

"You  've  got  to  stay  long  enough  for  me  to 
tell  you  something,"  Kenwick's  voice  cut  in 
authoritatively.  "But  you  could  n't  stay  long 
enough,  Jarvis,  for  me  to  thank  you  for  what 
you  've  done." 

His  caller  held  up  a  hand.  "Please  don't. 
Not  that — please." 

"But,"  Kenwick  went  on,  "you  Ve  got  to  hear 
an  apology.  I  was  just  about  on  the  verge  of  a 
collapse  over  there,  and  when  you  got  up 
in  court  as  the  representative  of  Glover 


292  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

Well,  I  did  n't  know  the  game,  you  see  and  I 
thought " 

"I  know;  Brutus."  It  was  Jarvis  who  finished 
the  sentence.  "And  in  a  sense,  you  were  right," 
he  went  on  slowly.  "For  what  I  did,  I  did — not 
for  you." 

"You  did  it  for  science,  of  course;  because  to 
you  I  was  an  interesting  case.  But  what  can  I 
ever  do  to  repay  you?  How  can " 

"I  have  been  paid."  The  same  haunting, 
baffling  expression  was  in  the  scientist's  eyes,  and 
he  was  not  looking  at  the  man  whom  his  testi 
mony  had  freed. 

"Oh,  I  don't  mean  money!"  Kenwick  cried 
hotly.  "I  know  you  have  that !" 

"I  don't  mean  money,  either."  He  forced  his 
gaze  back  to  his  host.  And  then  that  sixth  sense 
which  is  in  the  soul  of  every  creative  artist  awoke 
in  Kenwick' s  being  and  made  his  eyes  luminous 
with  understanding. 

Jarvis  picked  up  his  hat  from  the  chair  into 
which  it  had  dropped.  "I  'm  going  out  to  the 
Paddingtons'  for  dinner,"  he  said  casually.  "I  '11 

have  about "  He  snapped  open  the  cover  of 

his  watch,  then  closed  it  again.  "The  most  devil 
ish  thing  about  life  on  this  planet,  Kenwick,  is 
that  we  can't  do  very  much  for  each  other.  The 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  293 

game  is  largely  solitaire.  But  for  any  good  that 
I  ever  did  I  've  been  well  repaid.  Any  man 
ought  to  be  satisfied,  I  think,  when  the  gods  allow 
him  two  full  hours — in  Utopia." 


CHAPTER  XX 

IT  was  the  morning  after  his  acquittal  that 
Kenwick  and  Marcreta  Morgan  drove  out  of 
the  Paddington  gateway  in  one  of  the  Utopia 
machines.  They  turned  to  the  left  and  took  the 
stretch  of  perfect  asphalt  road  that  led  to  the 
old  Raeburn  house. 

The  mystery  of  its  destruction  had  never  been 
explained.  Richard  Glover,  and  every  one  else 
who  was  connected  with  the  case  of  Ralph  Regan, 
had  proved  a  satisfactory  alibi.  The  owner  of 
Rest  Hollow  had  been  notified  by  wire  of  its  de 
struction  and  he  had  replied  with  orders  that  the 
grounds  were  to  be  kept  locked  and  admission 
denied  to  all  callers.  It  had  undoubtedly  been 
one  of  the  handsomest  homes  in  a  community  of 
handsome  homes,  but  since  the  first  days  of  its 
existence  fate  had  destined  it  for  tragedy.  And 
perhaps  its  owner  was  relieved  to  know  that  only 
a  pile  of  whitening  ashes  marked  the  grave  of  his 
own  romance  and  the  prison  of  another  man's 
hope.  At  all  events,  the  mystery  of  its  passing 
never  has  been  solved,  and  conjecture  concerning 

294 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  295 

it  is  still  a  favorite  topic  around  the  tea-tables 
of  Mont-Mer's  fashionable  suburban  district. 

"But  I  want  to  see  it  in  ruins,"  Kenwick  had 
told  Marcreta  after  their  first  radiant  hour  to 
gether.  "I  want  to  know  that  it  is  really  gone 
off  the  face  of  the  earth,  so  that  when  it  comes  to 
me  in  memory  I  can  assure  myself  that  it  is  only 
a  dream." 

They  turned  the  last  corner  and  came  suddenly 
in  sight  of  the  tall  iron  gate.  Across  it  a  sinister 
chain  swung  ominously,  warning  the  world  away 
from  communication  with  that  most  dreadful 
affliction  that  can  befall  a  human  soul.  The  ruins 
of  Rest  Hollow  loomed  somber  and  shapeless 
before  them,  and  Roger  Kenwick  brought  his  car 
to  a  stop  in  the  very  spot  where  Arnold  Rogers 
had  once  halted,  hesitated,  and  then  gone  on  his 
way.  Guarding  the  pile  like  a  battered  but  re 
lentless  sentinel  was  the  tall,  charred  chimney  of 
the  dining-room.  As  he  looked  at  it,  Ken  wick's 
hand  sought  instinctively  for  that  of  the  woman 
beside  him,  as  though  to  assure  himself  of  her 
reality.  And  then  he  heard  himself  ask  the  ques 
tion  that  for  so  long  had  beaten  against  his  brain. 

"How  could  you  do  it?  How  could  you  send 
me  away  that  night,  dear,  into  the  horrors  of  war 
and — this,  without  hope*?" 


296  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"I  could  n't  know,"  she  told  him  desperately. 
"I  couldn't  foresee  what  was  coming.  And  I 
wanted  you  to  win  a  place  in  the  world.  I 
wanted  you  to  win,  as  I  knew  you  could  if  you 
were  unhampered  by " 

"Unhampered!"  He  echoed  the  word  in 
credulously,  as  though  it  were  quite  new  and  its 
meaning  not  clear.  "Is  any  one  ever  hampered 
by  love  and  inspiration  and  all  that " 

"You  don't  understand,"  she  said.  "Nobody 
can  understand  physical  disability  except  those 
who  have  suffered  it.  My  mother  had  a  sister 
who  was  a  bedridden  invalid.  She  helped  her 
husband  to  find  his  place  in  the  world  and  keep 
it.  But  he  never  seemed  to  realize  that  she  had 
helped  him.  He  always  thought,  though  I  sup 
pose  he  never  said,  that  his  marriage  had  held  him 
back.  And  she  died  at  last  of  a  broken  heart. 
Through  all  my  youth  I  had  her  tragedy  before 


me." 


There  was  a  moment  of  silence  between  them. 
And  then  Kenwick  spoke  slowly.  "You  had  n't 
much  faith  in  me,  Marcreta.  You  admit  now 
that  you  loved  me,  yet  you  had  n't  much  faith — 
in  my  character  or  my " 

"But  love  comes  a  long  time  before  faith, 
Roger.  It  always  does.  And  I  was  younger 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  297 

then.  I  didn't  know  so  much  about  life  and — 
and  character.  But,  oh,  when  they  wrote  me 
about  this!  I  would  have  given  anything  on 
earth  to  have  lived  over  again  our  last  night  to 
gether!" 

"I  know!  I  know!"  His  voice  was  vibrant 
with  self-reproach. 

"Your  brother  must  have  been  splendid,"  she 
went  on.  "He  wrote  me  such  a  wonderful  letter. 
But  he  could  n't  soften  it;  nobody  can  ever  dilute 
the  big  tragedies  of  life.  We  must  drink  them 
unstrained.  I  knew  that  you  were  somewhere  in 
this  county,  and  when  I  came  down  here,  just 
that  one  time,  I  liked  to  feel  that  I  was  near  you. 
I  could  n't  have  endured  to  see  you,  but  I  wanted 
to  be  near  you  for  a  little  while  before — I  did 
anything  else.  And  then  that  night  when  you 

came  back,  I  couldn't  be  sure Everything 

was  so  changed.  You  were  so  different  from  the 
carefree  boy  who  had  gone  away.  I  knew,  of 
course,  that  you  would  be;  in  a  sense,  I  wanted 
you  to  be.  But  I  did  n't  want  you  to  feel  bound 
by  anything  that  had  gone  before.  I  was  afraid 
you  might  feel  that  way.  Oh,  a  woman  is  at  such 
a  disadvantage,  Roger.  She  is  always  at  a  dis 
advantage  if  the  man  she  loves  is  honorable  and 
chivalrous." 


298  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

"I  had  work  to  do,"  he  reminded  her  gently. 
"I  had  to  quiet  the  title  to  my  name.  For  when 
a  woman  marries  a  man,  Marcreta,  she  marries 
his  past,  every  bit  of  it.  Before  I  could  offer  my 
,  life  to  you  again,  I  had  to  be  certain  that  every 
minute  of  it  was  clean  and  decent  and  above 
reproach.  I  was  not  willing  to  let  any  of  it  go 
on  the  grounds  of  irresponsibility.  I  never  would 
have  been  satisfied.  And  you  never  would  have 
been  satisfied.  There  would  always  have  been 
for  both  of  us  terrible  moments  of  doubt.  The 
bramble-bush  lay  between  us.  I  had  to  tear  it 
away  first;  I  had  to  tear  it  away  and  look  bravely 
at  whatever  lay  underneath." 

A  shaft  of  golden  sunlight  suddenly  broke 
through  the  January  clouds  and  slanted  across  the 
road.  Roger  Kenwick's  eyes  followed  it  as 
though  seeking  for  the  treasure  that  might  lie 
revealed  at  last  at  the  end  of  a  rainbow.  A  sharp 
exclamation  escaped  him.  And  he  felt  the  quick 
response  of  the  hand  that  still  lay  in  his. 

Drawing  the  heavy  motor-cloak  closer  about 
her,  he  helped  Marcreta  Morgan  out  of  the  car 
and  guided  her  to  a  spot  about  a  hundred  yards 
on  the  other  side  of  the  iron  gate.  "I  remember 
now!"  His  words  came  in  the  low,  awed  voice 
of  one  who  suddenly  encounters  in  broad  daylight 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  299 

some  object  that  has  played  conspicuous  part  in 
an  evil  and  oft-recurring  dream. 

"At  last!"  he  said,  and  stood  rooted  to  the 
roadside  gazing  at  the  thing  for  which,  during  the 
last  two  months,  he  had  been  so  desperately 
groping.  "This  one  thing,"  he  went  on,  "this  one 
thing  about  those  impenetrable  months  here  I  do 
remember.  I  believe  that  if  I  had  chanced  to  see 
it  on  that  afternoon  of  my  recovery,  if  I  had  only 
chanced  to  come  this  way  instead  of  around  by 
the  other  road,  it  might  have  restored  to  me  some 
memory  of  this  place." 

They  stood  now  on  the  edge  of  the  strip  of 
pavement,  where  dead  leaves  spread  a  spongy 
carpet  between  the  asphalt  and  the  barbed-wire 
fence  that  bordered  the  opposite  estate.  And 
what  they  looked  upon  was  a  huge  boulder,  half 
embedded  in  the  earth.  By  some  mighty  and 
persistent  force  it  had  been  rent  asunder,  and 
now,  up  through  the  cleft  which  tore  its  surface 
with  a  long  jagged  scar,  a  sapling  eucalyptus-tree, 
perfectly  shaped  and  beautifully  proportioned, 
had  pushed  its  way.  A  zephyr  or  perhaps  a  bird 
had  sown  the  seed  in  this  rock-bound  prison.  And 
with  a  vitality  that  appeared  incredible  it  had 
taken  root  and  grown  there,  stretching  vigorous, 
red-tipped  leaves  heavenward.  In  some  miracu- 


300  THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY 

lous  manner  its  tap-root  had  found  the  sustaining 
soil,  and  its  flame-colored  crown  the  sunlight. 
There  it  stood,  on  the  lonely  road  to  Rest  Hollow, 
a  living  torch  of  liberty,  flaunting  its  heroic 
triumph  above  the  shattered  body  of  its  foe. 

"On  the  day  that  Glover  first  brought  me  here, 
I  saw  that  tree."  Kenwick's  voice  was  scarcely 
more  than  a  whisper.  "I  remember  looking  out 
at  it  from  an  opening  in  the  fence.  I  didn't 
know  just  why  I  was  here,  but  I  had  a  sense  of — 
I  can't  describe  it  to  you — but  it  was  a  sense  of 
imprisonment.  I  knew  that  if  I  wanted  to  get 
out  of  that  place  I  could  n't  do  it,  and  there  's  no 
feeling  on  earth  like  that.  And  then  I  saw — this, 
and  it  thrilled  me.  In  a  curious,  unexplainable 
way  it  gave  me  hope.  I  don't  recall  anything 
else  about  the  place,  and  I  don't  remember 
whether  I  ever  saw  this  again.  But  during  these 
last  two  months  I  have  been  looking  for  something 
that  I  knew  I  had  lost  out  of  my  life,  and  here 
it  is." 

Marcreta  Morgan  reached  over  and  touched 
the  sapling's  damp  bark  with  reverent  fingers. 
From  a  cleft  in  the  conquered  boulder  came  the 
pungent  odor  of  the  crushed  leaves  that  were 
sustaining  this  new  life.  She  turned  to  the  man 
beside  her  with  shining  eyes. 


THE  REST  HOLLOW  MYSTERY  301 

"The  resurrection!"  she  cried. 

He  drew  her  close  to  him  beneath  the  tender 
branches  of  the  valiant  little  sapling. 

"An  imprisoned  soul,"  he  whispered,  "liber 
ated  at  last — by  the  miracle  of  love." 


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